Speed Soulmate Finding
by Ellana-san
Summary: Speed Soulmate Finding was a relatively new fashion trend that catered to people with outrageous soulmate words marked somewhere on their body, the kind of words nobody would utter on a chance meeting in the street, like 'Feed the fish" or 'An old apple visits Japan in the winter'.
1. Chapter 1

_I'm moving this out of HADS because I wrote a sequel that might turn into more ;)_

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 _Inspired by this post post/122354393196/you-know-that-soulmate-au-trope-where-the-first The idea is of a classic soulmate au where the first words your soulmate tells you are written on your wrist but where you do your best to have original first words so your soulmate finds you more easily. Modern au a bit cracky, nobody asked for it and I'm sorry._

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 _ **Speed Soulmate Finding**_

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Speed soulmate finding was tacky and a bit humiliating.

Effie was not sure at all why she had let her friend drag her to that bar in the first place. They lived in the twenty-first century, it was commonly agreed that soulmates weren't the do-all break-all they used to be and you could live perfectly happy with someone who _wasn't_ in fact fated to be your lifelong companion.

As for the concept of _speed soulmate finding_ in itself…

Effie pursed her lips as she surveyed the room they were in, unable to stop thinking the whole thing was preposterous and defied the whole purpose of fate. It was a relatively new fashion trend that catered to people with outrageous first words marked somewhere on their body, the kind of words nobody would utter on a chance meeting in the street, like _'Feed the fish", 'An old apple visits Japan in the winter'_ or ' _Camouflage paint is omni-present, just like candy'_. It had become a sort of trendy game to show up to those events with a nonsense generator app on your phone and to offer the most original first words you could in the off-chance that the person in front of you would have them tattooed somewhere. When you truly thought about it, it was the egg and the chicken question. Had the trend appeared because people had weird soulmate words or had weird soulmate words started to appear because of the trend?

The bar would have otherwise been nice enough, she supposed while taking a sip of her overpriced chardonnay, if the owners hadn't gone overboard to try and make it _romantic_ on top of quaint. There _was_ something like trying too hard and, clearly, nobody had told them that putting pink ribbons everywhere and dimming the lights so much you could _barely_ see where you were walking wasn't the right way to achieve a mood conductive to romance.

"Tell me again…" she cringed around another fortifying sip of her wine. "Why are we here?"

Portia, her dark eyes twinkling with her customary spark of mischief, batted her fake eyelashes in the innocent but enticing way that usually earned her free drinks wherever they went. Effie might have been more amused if she wasn't facing the dreadful perspective of sitting on an uncomfortable chair for the next half-hour. There were at least fifty small tables spaced around the room, each had two chairs on opposite sides, a candle at the center, and, since it wasn't the first time Portia dragged her to that kind of things, she knew she would have to suffer through thirty minutes of first words that would aim to be _unique_ and would end up being taxing very, very soon.

"Because…" Portia sighed, drawling the word out as if Effie was being particularly difficult – and perhaps she _was_ but she had _really_ wanted to catch that new rom-com at the theater before a night at the club, _not_ waste her whole evening in one of those little bars that specialized in stealing an ungodly amount of money for the supposed chance of finding one's soulmate. "We will either find the love of our live or a hook-up for the night."

Effie pursed her lips tighter, taking another glance around the room, not seeing anyone she would actually want to hook up with even for a one-night-stand. "Your soulmate words are _not_ outrageous. I do not understand why you always insist on coming to these events."

" _Yours_ are." Portia pointed out.

"Mine are _rude_ , that is what they are." she huffed. "And I have no interest in meeting a rude soulmate, thank you very much."

It wasn't that she was cynical. She was not. She believed in love. She loved the idea of love. She was famous in her circle of friends for falling in love easily and hard. She had had her share of love stories over the years, some had lasted months and others a handful of days but she had always been honest with her feelings.

Love didn't scare her.

A soulmate was something else.

A soulmate had a finality to it she wasn't sure she liked. To be destined to spend your life with someone… It was different.

Besides, the words that were stamped high on her inner thigh were not the most likely to change her mind. It was lucky they were in such an intimate place because she wasn't sure she would have borne well having to see them every day. That way, at least, she could pretend they did not exist.

"The blonde is cute." Portia pointed out, discreetly pointing at a busty woman on the other side of the room.

Effie entertained the thought of chatting her up for a second, if only to make time go faster, but ended up pouting. "She is not really my type. The man over there is not too bad, though."

The man was dressed like a classy rock star. He was wearing designer jeans artfully slashed on the thighs, a tight slightly see-through black shirt under a grey suit jacket, and the diamond earring on his left earlobe matched Portia's nose piercing. He also had gold eyeliner that seemed to glow on his dark skin. In other words, he was _delicious_.

"Dibs." Portia called quickly.

Effie rolled her eyes. "I saw him first." She was far too amused by the determined glint in Portia's gaze though, so she lifted her glass of chardonnay in a half toast. "You can have him but the next handsome man is mine."

Just as she finished that sentence, as if fate itself had heard her and provided with a dramatic entrance, the door to the bar opened, letting in a waft of freezing wind, and three men walked in. Well… To be more accurate, a tall laughing black man with a missing hand was dragging the one in the middle by the lapel of his coat and the third one was giving the middle one a firm push on the back.

The three of them were handsome enough although Effie quickly discarded the third one as being too young – and vaguely familiar for some reason – and the first one as being too… boorish. The one in the middle, the one who seemed so reluctant to be there and was clearly gritting his teeth, had some charm if one liked the rough country type.

His dirty blond hair was too long and tangled, his stubble was unkempt, his jeans weren't torn because a designer had willed it so, and he clearly had no fashion sense. He also had striking grey eyes that briefly met hers, because the first thing he did was look around the room to assert his surroundings, and she felt something _clench_ in her stomach.

She decided it was the wine and turned toward the bar to inspect her reflection in the big polished mirror. She looked alright – _perfect_ if she did say so herself but, then again, that was the huge plus of being a model and having a stylist for a best friend. Her red dress was tight and hugged her where it counted, the gold jewelry was discreet enough to complete her outfit, her make-up was still intact and she truly needed to send her thanks to the cosmetic company for sending her that free lipstick because there was _no_ stain on the glass and she didn't need to apply a new layer… Her blond hair didn't please her but, then again, it never did and she self-consciously patted the curls that loosely fell around her face, privately lamenting the copper hues that showed when she tilted her head.

"You look gorgeous." Portia said soothingly. "What about me? What do you think?"

"You are always beautiful." Effie answered. "As you are well aware."

Her friend chuckled and tossed her midnight blue dyed hair over her shoulder. "I _am_."

The cringe-worthy screeching of a mic being turned on made everyone look at the small stage in the corner on which a man with a blinding turquoise tuxedo and an even more impressive quaff flashed them a white teeth smile. "Hello, everyone, I am Caesar Flickerman and I will be Cupid for you tonight!"

In the polite silence, someone let out a loud snort.

Effie wasn't surprised to see it was the unkempt man. She pursed her lips. As ridiculous as the event was, his behavior was rude and she abhorred rudeness.

The host didn't let that deter him though. "Please, proceed to the bar in an orderly fashion, you will find badges to write your name on. Then either take a seat or stand along the wall. Half of you will remain at their table and the other half will move clockwise around the room. In thirty minutes, we'll mix the groups."

Effie was familiar enough with the proceedings. She and Portia took their time gathering their coats and purses to avoid being crushed by the eager crowd massing around the bar. Truly, you would have thought they had never seen a rectangular piece of paper and a safety pin.

She _wasn't_ looking forward to the safety pin. It might damage the dress.

"Excuse me? You're Effie Trinket, right?"

The vaguely familiar young man from earlier was standing right next to her and was flashing her a wolfish grin.

"You _do_ know you are not supposed to talk to people until the speed soulmate finding actually starts, do you?" she retorted, her lips stretching into a grin of her own.

The young man laughed and outstretched a hand. "I'm Finnick. We worked together on a shoot, once?"

"Oh, Finnick Odair, of course!" she exclaimed, shaking his hand. She finally placed his face. He was the new rising star of the modeling agency. Not quite famous yet, not on the same scale she was, but he was getting there. Seneca always sang his praises.

Portia discreetly touched her shoulder and Effie introduced them but her friend quickly excused herself. "Keep chatting. I will get the badges."

"And another glass of wine, please." she requested, turning back to Finnick. "Well, I am sorry to say you are not my soulmate."

Finnick buried his hands in his pockets and shrugged, looking a little sheepish. "I've already found mine, actually. I'm just here for…"

He let his sentence trail off in an embarrassed silence and she decided to save him from awkwardness.

"A laugh?" she finished with a soft chuckle. "I can understand that. I have been dragged here against my will."

His face lightened up with amusement. "Really? That's funny. Chaff and I had the same idea…" He nodded to the table where his other two friends were sitting. The unkempt man was nursing a whiskey, his head propped on his hand, and the one with the missing hand was obviously making fun of him. "Haymitch isn't big on soulmates but we were tired of watching him mop around. We saw the sign outside and we thought… Who knows, right? Maybe it will be good for him to find someone. Soulmate or not."

 _Haymitch_. What a peculiar name.

He must have felt her staring because his grey eyes darted up and straight into hers. He held her gaze for a couple of seconds and then slowly let it roam all over her body… He was so obviously – so _openly_ – picturing her naked that she huffed at the lack of manners. She didn't object to his checking her out – she _was_ attractive, it was a common reaction for men and women alike to imagine her naked – but _she_ did object to the lack of discretion. _Manners_ , as her mother would have said.

Again she felt that weird clenching sensation in her stomach. She deliberately tossed him an unimpressed look and turned aside so he wouldn't be in her line of sight anymore. Still, she felt his stare linger, particularly on her lower back.

The rudeness of some people, the _rudeness_!

She directed the conversation to safer waters than the strange company Finnick liked to keep. They politely chatted about the modeling agency they both belonged to, about the young man's upcoming photoshoots and any advice she could give him. She found herself actually _liking_ him. He was polite, nice and attractive enough. It was a shame he was so young – she didn't mind a small age difference but she liked her men older, always had – and had apparently already found his soulmate – a marine biologist named Annie Cresta who, he informed her, he was determined to marry within the year.

" _Alright_!" Caesar cheerfully boomed in his mic. "Please, put your badge on and get ready."

Effie and Finnick said their goodbyes, she accepted the badge and the glass of wine Portia offered her and opted to move around the room rather than take a seat. Her figure looked best when she was walking and while she hadn't yet found anyone she would like to possibly sleep with, she liked to be prepared. Portia preferred to sit down – probably because the handsome man they had noticed before was in the standing group and thus she wouldn't have to wait another half hour to meet him; it was forcing fate but who was Effie to judge? She put her coat and purse aside so she wouldn't have to carry them but not far enough that she wouldn't be able to keep an eye on them. The last thing she needed was to get robbed.

She kept her phone and quickly downloaded one of the nonsense app while Caesar finished explaining the rules. They would have one minute at each table, they had to move clockwise around the room, if they found their soulmate they could simply exit the game, and after half an hour, once everyone had met everyone on the opposite group, they would switch things around so that people in their respective group could meet each other.

"May the odds be ever in your favor!" Caesar wished, clearly invested in his role as Cupid.

Effie took a seat at the closest table. The woman in front of her was twenty years older, had long washed-out blond-grey hair that was in a _terrible_ need of a trim and she had milky grey eyes that immediately made her want to run in the other direction. Alma – as the badge pinned on her chest told her – remained silent so Effie tapped on the app and generated a random sentence.

"A setback of the heart is always a pleasure." she read and looked up, waiting but not really expecting anything. The woman was making a face and she couldn't blame her. "Yes, it does sound rather ridiculous, doesn't it? I take it those are not your words."

"No." the woman snapped.

The timer buzzed and Effie moved along, not sad to leave that one behind. The next one was a man who looked far too eager.

"Fashion gambles with lives, happiness, and even destiny itself!" he exclaimed before she was even properly seated. There was no phone on the table so she concluded he was one of those who liked to actually _create_ those nonsensical sentences.

"So close." she lamented with a fake sigh.

"Really?" the man perked up.

The buzzer saved her from her own lie. The third one was Portia and Effie sighed for real. "I _cannot_ bear thirty minutes of this."

"Make an effort, darling." Portia laughed. "Who knows… Maybe you will find them tonight."

She took a long sip of her wine and sighed again. "You are a _terrible_ friend."

"You will thank me when you have your soulmate." Portia retorted. "Now, wish me luck. The hottie is three tables away."

The hottie's name, she had spied earlier on his badge, was Cinna.

She did wish her best friend luck before moving along. She kept an eye on Portia for the next three rounds and felt some sort of pang when she saw her brighten once the mysterious handsome rock-star look-alike sat down. He never stood up again when the timer buzzed. There were tears in Portia's eyes and they were clutching hands over the table. The way they were looking at each other, you would think the rest of the world had faded away.

Effie knew Portia had found her soulmate.

It was obvious.

A lot of people in the room were staring at them with envy written across their face.

She wanted to go to her friend, congratulate her and be introduced to the man who had been destined to such a fantastic person but she knew she would only have intruded on precious first moments and, besides, she couldn't leave her spot in the line without derailing the whole thing.

She lost count of the people she faced, her eyes still straying to Portia and the stranger from time to time, when she ended up sitting in front of Finnick.

"Two-finger John comes asking for bread." he told her very seriously.

"Love loves to love." she answered, reading whatever had appeared on her app.

"I dare you to say it three times and quicker." Finnick mocked. She rolled her eyes at him but couldn't stop her smile. The young man nodded at where Portia and the stranger were still holding hands. "Your friend found her match."

"It certainly looks like it." she hummed. That or it was love at first sight.

At the next table, she met Finnick's friend Chaff. The man looked at her up and down as she walked to his table, not even trying to hide his leering. "Love, I'm probably not your soulmate but I can show you a good time tonight…"

She pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes at him. "Does that line _ever_ work for you?"

He laughed good-naturally. He had a good laugh, she decided, too loud for her taste, almost like a dog's bark, but it was boisterous enough to make him likeable.

"More than you know." He smirked and his gaze darted to her next table, the one where the last man of their little trio was sitting facing a clearly annoyed red-haired woman. Not that Effie had been keeping track of him but he hadn't been paying attention to _any_ of the people who had sat down in front of him. Chaff noticed her glancing and winced. "Don't mind Haymitch too much. He's having a rough patch."

The timer buzzed on that strange warning and she took her phone and her almost empty glass of chardonnay and crossed the small distance to the next table. She was irritated that the infamous Haymitch couldn't even be bothered to _look up_ after having checked her out so thoroughly earlier. She _did_ look at her best when she was walking, particularly when she put that little _swing_ in her hips.

He didn't look up from his glass of whiskey when she sat down either, he didn't say anything at all, and she wondered if he had been doing that all night, letting people speak first and not even bothering to dismiss them when whatever they said didn't match his soulmate words. He was so unpleasant that she refused to play his game.

She cleared her throat.

It took him so long to drag his eyes up from his glass that she wondered just how drunk he was. _Tipsy_ was a given. His gaze seemed to spark with interest but it might just have been a trick of the light, the candle between them did toss some strange shadows on the rough wood of the table.

They stared at each other for what felt like _hours_ but couldn't have been more than seconds.

Her stomach was doing that weird clenching thing again and she hoped she wasn't coming down with a bug or something equally unpleasant. It felt a little like trepidation but it was ridiculous because the chances that…

"Bozo the clown called…" he sneered and her heart started racing in her chest. "He wants his make-up back."

It wasn't something he had made up as a joke either. He clearly meant it. He clearly meant every _rude_ word of it.

Twenty-five years.

She had had those words branded on her inner thigh for twenty-five years and she had always found them terribly rude and uncouth but had hoped, despite her best judgment, that someone would eventually utter them on a photoshoot when she was wearing a particularly outrageous make-up or that there would, at least, be a good explanation for someone to offer them as first words.

And yet there he was, easy as you pleased, simply being not only _rude_ but _mean._

And that man was her soulmate.

That man had sentenced her to have those ridiculous _humiliating_ words branded on her body for eternity.

She decided there and then that she would go to the closest tattoo parlor first thing the next day and would do whatever was necessary to have those words covered. _Obliterated._ Who needed a soulmate anyway?

The timer buzzed but she didn't move, not even when the man who was supposed to take her place hovered uncertainly next to her chair, unwilling to ask her if she was going to move on because then _that_ would have been the first words she or Haymitch would hear from him and…

Haymitch was still staring at her but he looked a little more alert now, a little less drunk.

"What's wrong, sweetheart?" he asked, straightening up. "Cat got your tongue?"

It was uncertain, nervous…

She wondered if he had felt his stomach clench too when he had looked at her. How fitting that the warning that your soulmate was near felt like stomach cramps.

She realized she was clutching her phone so hard her fingers hurt and she slowly forced herself to relax, loosen the tension in her shoulders, jut her chin higher…

"Please, do not hold up the line!" Caesar demanded in his mic, with a touch of nervousness. She was probably derailing the whole carefully thought through speed soulmate finding process but she couldn't even care. Not about that and not about the attention they were gathering.

She thought about simply standing up and storming off, leaving him with the uncertainty for the rest of his life but, in the end, she thought it would be a far more appropriate punishment to _let him know_ what he was missing. She was beautiful and he wasn't even in her league.

"I would not get too close to that candle…" she hissed when he leaned toward her a bit, clearly about to impart another of his thoughtful comments. "...you are so full of alcohol you might catch fire."

He violently recoiled but she didn't stay to see how he would react. She doubted he was in any state to stand anyway. Certainly not by himself.

She stormed where she had left her coat and her purse, batting her fake eyelashes to fight the ridiculous tears that burned her eyes. There was a big lump in her throat that she swallowed back as she pushed the door of the bar open. The air outside was freezing but it felt good on her flushed cheeks.

She rummaged in her purse for her keys, remembered only too late that they had taken Portia's car, and cursed. She unlocked her phone to order a ride but, just then, the door to the bar opened again and Haymitch staggered out, his coat still half on. He looked wildly around him and seemed to relax when he spotted her. He finished shouldering on his coat and she quickly decided she could just as well walk home.

She took off down the street, annoyed by the dress that kept inching up with every of her angry step and by the heels that hadn't been made for trekking all the way across town. Her feet would _bleed_ by the time she reached her destination.

Of course, he was taller than she was – at least, he would have been taller if she hadn't been wearing heels – and he caught up with her in seconds.

"Effie."

Her name sounded rough and strange on his tongue.

"How do you know my name?" she snarled.

For a moment, she dared hope the whole thing was a setup. Portia knew her soulmate words so perhaps the whole thing was a joke, perhaps she had paid that man to… But his first words would still be the same and that might still mean… Besides, Portia would _never_. She had other friends whose friendship was cruel and filled with rivalry but not Portia.

"The… thingy." Haymitch said, sounding a tad sheepish, as he waved at a spot on his own shirt under his open coat. At his badge. His handwriting was _atrocious_. Why wasn't she surprised?

She glanced down at her own chest and almost tore the safety pin from her dress. She tossed the whole thing on the pavement. He looked like he wanted to make some comment about trash and where it belonged – in a bin and not on the pavement, she agreed but she was angry – but wisely refrained from saying anything about it.

"Look…" he tried. "I'm…"

"If you say you are sorry, I will _slap_ you." she warned, quickening her strides.

He frowned, looking particularly suspicious."Okay? Works for me. I ain't really the _sorry_ kind of guy anyway."

She would have crossed the street even though the sign was red for pedestrian if he hadn't stopped her by grabbing her arm. Good thing too because a car flew past just at that moment. She still shrugged his hand of and whirled around to face him, her features contorted with fury.

"Do _not_ presume it is because I feel you do not owe me an apology." she snapped. "You _do_ owe me an apology but I find I am not inclined to accept it regardless. Do you know _how long_ I knew you would be a rude _nasty_ person? I _never_ wanted to meet you. Who wants a rude nasty soulmate? _No one,_ that's who."

She turned around and stormed down the street again, leaving him to stand there or catch up.

He caught up.

"Hey!" he scowled. "What should _I_ say, sweetheart? _Your_ soulmate words told me I'd be a drunk before I was even old enough to have a drink."

She scoffed and aggressively fished around her purse until she found her cigarettes. She wedged one between her lips and looked for her lighter without finding it.

Oh, how she hated _everything_ about that night… Even the way he was calling her _sweetheart_ … Dismissive and condescending… It was _just_ her luck to have a soulmate like that, _just her luck_.

"You smoke?" He made a face. "I hate the smell."

"Good thing there clearly has been a mistake and we are _not_ going to pursue this soulmate thing, then, isn't it?" she muttered around the butt of her cigarette.

She ended up almost dropping her purse in her hopeless quest for her lighter and he sighed. He took something out of his pocket and, next thing she knew, there was a lit match next to her mouth, the flame flickering hard in time with their long strides.

"I'm gonna try not to breathe too hard on it." He snorted. "Wouldn't want to _catch fire_ and everything."

She stopped her mad dash down the street and cupped her hands around the end of her cigarette to let him light it for her.

"If you do not smoke why do you keep matches in your pockets?" she challenged, blowing out some smoke.

He smirked at her and, without its mocking edge, it was actually… No… It was infuriating all the same.

"Cause it's a good way to pick up girls who do." he retorted. He tilted his head, his grey eyes twinkling with a teasing glint. "Or maybe I'd just felt my soulmate'd be a smoker."

"With first words like that, you could _not_ have been looking for me." she argued with a huff. Everyone was careful with their words when they met someone else for the first time. You had to be when you knew those words would be written somewhere on someone's skin. She started walking again but not at such a brisk pace. "I _highly_ doubt you keep matches in your pocket in the faint hope I would one day need them."

"Do you always talk like that?" he asked and he sounded far too amused.

"Do you mean _properly_?" she replied, chancing a glance at him. He was watching her but his face was blank. The only thing that gave away the fact that he found her funny – _funny indeed_ , she _wasn't_ trying to be funny, she was _incensed_ – was the twinkle in his eyes. He _did_ have startling grey eyes. And he also had nice hands. She had noticed when he had lit her cigarette. She did like nice strong hands. But she did not like him. Not at all. Perhaps he was handsome for his type but she could never accept _rude_. "I did notice you have a tendency to butcher grammar."

"I meant _posh_." he clarified, apparently not at all offended by her remarks about his grammar. "Like something crawled up your ass and died there."

She was so shocked she gaped at him. Her cigarette almost _fell_ from her mouth and that wasn't at all the sexiest display.

"How… You… This…" she stuttered and then she tossed both hands in the air, purse and cigarette along with them, and quickened her pace. "Let's pretend we _never_ met. _A lot_ of people never meet their soulmate and live _very_ happy lives. We will just have to be one of them."

He didn't try to catch up with her again.

She walked ahead for a few minutes, nervously smoking her cigarette, aware he was still following her because she could hear the echo of his footsteps. When her cigarette was finished and she had no choice but toss it on the pavement and pause to crush it under her heel, she finally looked back. He slowly bridged the distance that separated them.

" _Did_ you hope to meet your soulmate?" she asked.

He lifted his eyebrows and shrugged. His hands were in his pockets and he had buttoned up his grey coat at some point . "Not really, no."

She tilted her head. "Then why are you still following me?"

He studied her for a second and then looked away at the shop window in front of which they had stopped. It was a bakery and there were darling mouth-watering cakes on display.

"Cause it ain't the nicest neighborhood and you're _fucking_ hot." he muttered. "Ain't really safe for you to walk alone."

That was so not what she had been expecting him to answer that she almost gaped again. _Almost_. She wouldn't be caught dead impersonating a fish twice in the same night.

"That is surprisingly gentlemanly of you." she commented.

"I ain't a gentleman." he denied and then chuckled. "Hell, I'm probably the opposite of the kind of guys you usually date…"

She didn't bother refuting that because it was obvious, she simply lifted an eyebrow. "I do not _only_ date _men._ How old-fashioned of you to assume! But, men or women, it is true you do not hold a candle to them."

He was speechless for a moment but it didn't last long. Next thing she knew he was licking his lips and sighing. "Look, I'm a bitter old drunk who's got too much trauma baggage… Ain't exactly the stuff of dream when soulmates are concerned…"

She pursed her lips and studied him. "You are not _that_ old."

She chose to pass on the _drunk_ part. She wasn't sure if it was an euphemism or an actual problem of his and she wasn't sure she wanted to tackle that on their first meeting.

"I'm thirty." he volunteered.

"That is not old _at all_." she countered. It used to feel like it was, once. Thirty had been a lifetime away to her eighteen year-old self. But then she had hit twenty-five and it hadn't seemed that old anymore.

"It's old for me." he dismissed, dragging his gaze away from the cakes on displays and back to her. "Point is… You're hot and you're feisty and if you were anyone else I'd be trying to get into your pants but I'm not looking for anything serious. Soulmate sounds serious."

There was this _jolt_ every time their eyes met and she briefly wondered if he felt it too, if it was the soulmate bond or just plain old chemistry.

She thought of Portia with a pang of jealousy. It had seemed so _easy_ for her… She had found her soulmate and it had all looked like rainbows and butterflies. He had probably already swept her up her feet by then. She had probably not even noticed the whole drama surrounding Effie and Haymitch.

Of course, _her_ soulmate couldn't be easy. Of course.

At least he thought she was hot – despite the make-up he apparently wasn't a fan of. And feisty. Whatever that was supposed to mean. She chose to take it as a compliment.

"You do realize other men would be _killing_ for the chance of being my soulmate, don't you?" she scorned. She didn't like getting the _I don't want anything serious_ speech from her soulmate, she didn't like getting that speech at all. If anyone was to give that speech, it would be _her_ and on her terms. "I am a model, a _fairly_ famous one at that. Not only am I gorgeous, I am _wealthy_ , smart enough _and_ not quite as good at holding a grudge as I should be. I will take that apology now."

He stared at her, opening and closing his mouth a couple of times, clearly taken aback. In the end, he let out a long mocking whistle. "You're the most arrogant girl I've ever met."

She pursed her lips, narrowed her eyes at him and tilted her head, hands finding her hips. "That is _not_ an apology."

"I ain't going to apologize." he scoffed.

"Then I will not let you buy me that drink." she retorted.

"What didn't you understand when I told you I didn't want anything serious?" he spat. "I ain't buying you a drink. I ain't interested in this soulmate thing. The _fuck_ did I even do to end up with someone like _you_ for a soulmate?"

He looked stricken by what had just come out of his mouth but she doubted it had to do with how upsetting it could have been for her to hear. There was guilt and regret and self-loathing battling all over his face. Whatever had happened to him, she instinctively knew it had been bad.

"Something very good I would say." She forced some cheer in her voice.

He sneered but it wasn't really directed at her. "If you knew half of it…"

"I feel generous tonight, you can tell me all about it." she granted. A shame the bakery was closed for the night, those cakes did look delicious.

"You're deluded." he accused.

"Manners." she chided, peering through the shop window. She might come back the next day. Although she _ought_ to be careful with her diet but…

"Ten minutes ago you wanted nothing to do with me and _now_ you're saying you wanna give this a shot?" he scowled.

"What can I say? Your charm won me over." she deadpanned, glancing up to note the name. _Mellark's Bakery_. She looked around for a street name or a familiar landmark and realized she had no clue at all where she was. All in all, it was probably a good thing Haymitch had followed her.

"You're crazy!" he spat again and then started laughing a bitter broken laugh. "That's my punishment, right? I get a crazy soulmate who wears a can of paint on her face!" He shook his head. "Screw fate. I ain't doing this. I _ain't_!"

He walked away.

She watched him leave, torn between the urge to run after him and the relief to be able to put that whole night behind her. Tomorrow would be a brand new day. She knew Finnick was friend with him and Seneca knew how to contact Finnick. If she wanted to find him again, the possibility would be there.

She was just about to turn away and leave the other way, wherever it might lead her, when he abruptly whirled around and came stalking back, murder in his strides.

"Why did you change your mind?" he barked.

"I told you." she hissed, irritated by his tone. "It _must_ have been your charm."

He rolled his eyes but some of his annoyance seemed to melt. "Come one. Stop _fucking_ with me."

"Language." She let out a long suffering sigh. "I assure you there will be no… _fucking_ unless you learn to mind your language."

"Maybe I could teach you to color yours a bit, sweetheart…" he taunted. "Maybe I could even knock that pole off your ass."

"My name is Effie, not sweetheart." she snapped, refusing to take the bait. Let him assume she was a prude if that amused him. What did she care?

"What made you change your mind? _Sweetheart_." It was almost a snarl this time and he took a step closer, invading her space. She could feel his breath on her face and it didn't smell as pleasant as she would have liked her soulmate's breath to smell.

She snarled right back though, jutted her chin higher, refusing to be intimidated. "I do not like being told what to do. It is one thing for _me_ to decide I do not like you and entirely another for _you_ to _reject me_. I will _not_ be rejected. _I_ will decide if we act on the soulmate bond or not."

He scowled. "You're impossible."

" _You_ are impossible." she retorted. " _This_ is impossible."

"Glad we agree." he sneered.

Her eyes darted to his lips.

It was because of the sneer.

Just because of the sneer.

And she definitely did _not_ thought they were close enough to kiss.

And she did _not_ let herself entertain the idea.

Where had the desire come from? Her cheeks were burning, the staring was going on too long, the silence was stretching… He shifted, leaned in _that_ little bit more… She slightly tilted her head in answer…

And then he started striding away again, leaving her standing there, flushed and aroused.

That was one insult too many.

"I did not want to pursue this anyway!" she called after him, her feelings hurt.

She did turn around and walk this time. And she did _not_ look back. And if there were tears in her eyes, she batted them away.

The worst thing was…

She wasn't surprised when someone grabbed her arm and whirled her around.

A part of her had expected it.

A part of her also expected the kiss.

Another part of her knew he was half-waiting for her to slap him and send him packing, that he almost _hoped_ she would because it would make it easier for him. She wasn't sure _how_ she knew but she _did_.

The kiss was hard, _challenging_ … His tongue forced its way in her mouth and he tasted like whiskey. She had never liked whiskey. She countered by sliding her fingers in his hair and _tugging_ just enough that it would sting… He pushed her against the cold glass of the bakery's shop window. The kiss turned violent, _dirty_ … His stubble rubbed hard against her chin, her jaw… She would have marks, she knew but she couldn't care… She couldn't care because his hands had found her waist and were trailing their way _up_ … She accidentally scratched his neck with her nails and he grunted in her mouth, his hips jerking forward…

"You'd be better off without me." he warned against her lips.

She let out a rare but elegant snort. " _You_ clearly would _not_ be."

She expected another gibe but he drew his head back instead. Their entire bodies were still flushed tight together, so tight she could feel the beginning of his erection against her stomach, so tight they would probably get arrested for indecency if they didn't move soon… His breath played on her lips and she shivered.

"You're _fucking_ perfect…" he told her. "If I was a better man, I'd do you a favor and walk away… But you're _fucking_ perfect…"

She wasn't sure she could say the reverse was true because she wasn't sure he was perfect for her. But he _needed_ her. He so _obviously_ needed her…

"Can I see them?" she asked. "The soulmate words?"

He stepped back slowly, not quite enough not to still be in her space anymore, and unbuttoned his coat. Then he pulled his woolen sweater and his undershirt up with one hand and tugged his pants down as much as they would go with the belt still on. It was enough for her to guess at the hint of pale hair and the waistband of his underwear. It was also enough for to spot her words in her neat handwriting, hidden in the triangle under his hip bone.

Part of the word _close_ was missing, as was _candle and catch_. A big swollen scar ran across her mark, slashing his entire side, so terrible and ugly looking that she instinctively knew the injury must have been life-threatening.

He could have died before she had even met him.

She reached out for her words, brushed her fingertips against them and then ended up retracing the impressive length of the scar.

He sucked in a breath. "You keep touching me like that, sweetheart, we're gonna have a problem."

She looked up at him, a smile playing on her lips. "Would that _truly_ be a problem though?"

She almost told him again to forget the pet name but she didn't mind it that much this time. When he wasn't being a condescending jerk, it didn't sound _that_ tacky.

"Depends if the owner frowns on people _fucking_ in front of their bakery." he joked, nodding at the shop window.

She didn't bat an eyelash but her smile turned salacious. Her voice was a seductive purr. "I _bet_ we could give them such a show they would not complain."

She decided she _loved_ leaving him speechless.

He licked his lips and took another step back, tugging his shirt down. She dropped her hand but immediately regretted the loss of contact.

"Can I see yours?" he asked and when she frowned in question, he clarified. "The words."

"Oh…" She flashed him another grin. " _Perhaps_. Not in public though. Not if you do not wish to give the bakery's owners a show."

That caught his attention fast. "Where are they?"

"Walk me home if you wish to find out." she dared him.

She ducked past him and sauntered away, not even bothering to hide her smile when he quickly appeared at her side, matching his pace to hers.

"You know…" he drawled out. "Most people have their soulmate words on _normal_ places like the wrist or something."

"I am not most people and from what I can see neither are you." she dismissed.

"Could be a serial killer for all you know." he insisted. "You're playing with fire asking strangers to walk you home when you're wearing that sort of dress…"

The comment about the dress pleased her but she bit back her smile. "You are not _a stranger._ You are my soulmate." Although she supposed even serial killers must have had soulmates. She glanced at him, calculating. " _Are_ you a serial killer?"

She expected another joke, not his face closing off. "I've killed people, lots of people. Might as well put that out there _now_. Not for pleasure though." He paused for a second and then shrugged. "That's in the past. Better leave it there."

The confession threw her but she rolled with it. That was her gift. She would roll with anything, plant a smile on her smile, school her features and just… play the game.

"Were you a mob hitman?" she asked.

He snorted and shook his head. "Soldier."

Ah. That actually explained some of his behavior. And the scar.

She wrapped her arms around his and pretended she didn't notice his flinch. "If you were so opposed to the idea of meeting your soulmate, why did you come after me?"

She didn't ask what he had been doing there in the first place since Finnick had already told her that they had dragged him to the speed soulmate finding but he _could_ have chosen to remain inside and let her vanish into the night.

"Maybe I didn't." he challenged. "You're so full of yourself… Maybe I was just gonna leave. Besides… You were the one standing there waiting for me."

"I was _not_ waiting for you, I was about to call for a car." she refuted. "And I saw the look on your face when you spotted me. You were in a hurry too. You _were_ coming after me, why can't you admit it?"

"Okay. Fine. Maybe I was." he grumbled. "What can I say? You're hot and I was an ass so…"

She grinned and pressed a little tighter against his side. "Apology accepted."

"Wasn't an apology." he argued.

"It was certainly a _poorly worded_ apology but I will take it." she graciously acknowledged.

He opened his mouth and then closed it with a sigh. "You think most soulmates bicker like an old married couple within an hour of meeting each other or are we setting up a record, here?"

"Why, Haymitch…" She looked up at him, battling her eyelashes… It was the first time she used his name too and he startled a little but not in a bad way. "Is that a proposal?"

The look on his face… He looked so panicked that she burst out laughing. She didn't remember the last time she had laughed like that, without having to fake her amusement or restrain it into something seemly. She couldn't remember when she had last simply laughed without worrying about how it made her look or what people would think.

"You're mean." he sulked. "Figures, I've got a mean soulmate."

She leaned her head against his shoulder, tightening her hold on his arm because her heels were starting to hurt her feet and her balance wasn't optimal. "I will be _very_ nice with you so you might forgive me, darling."

He seemed to like when she purred like that. She would have to remember to purr some more. Or, perhaps, to dare him to _make her_ purr some more.

"Darling?" he grumbled. "I ain't some domesticated cat, sweetheart."

"Two can play at the pet names game, _honey_." she shot back.

"Fine. _Princess_." He scoffed.

She pouted and then sighed. "I do not dislike _princess_ , actually. It is acceptable."

"You certainly talk like one." he mocked.

"Do not worry, I will teach you proper English in due time." she teased right back.

It was tentative but she felt his head slowly tilt to rest on top of hers. It wasn't the most comfortable position to walk in and she could tell he was a little ill-at-ease.

"I'm glad you're witty." he said, seemingly out of the blue. "I mean… You're _fucking_ hot and that's… That's good. But…"

"Good." she cut him off, taking pain to hide her amusement and sound neutral.

" _More_ than good." he amended, a little panicky.

She bit down on her bottom lip. " _Just_ more than good?"

"Come on…" he scowled. "You know you look…" He stopped and took his head off the top of hers. "Are you making fun of me?"

She propped her chin on his shoulder to look up at him. "I thought you were glad I was witty?"

She yelped when she found herself pinned to a nearby lamppost, his mouth torturing hers again. That kiss was no less dirty than the previous one but it was a little less brutal. One of his hand found her butt and squeezed though.

"Ruffian." she accused. She almost laughed again. She felt drunk. She wondered if that was a normal side effect of finding one's soulmate or if it was all the whiskey Haymitch had drunk that was making her inebriated through the kissing.

He drew back to give her one long searching look and then he smirked that slow smirk that, she was quickly learning, made butterflies flutter in her stomach.

"And doesn't _that_ float your boat…" he taunted. "Got a thing for the bad boy, _princess?_ "

She rolled her eyes and grabbed the lapels of his coat but didn't tug him closer just yet. "What do you know… Perhaps we _are_ made for each other after all…"

And, perhaps, she could make her peace with that.

 _Even_ if it sentenced her to have a clown's name branded on her inner thigh for all eternity.

* * *

 _I spent all day writing it yesterday so I hope you liked it! Let me know your thoughts!_


	2. Chapter 2

_I caved and wrote more. And I will probably write more parts so... Yeah. I hope you enjoy this sequel!_

* * *

Haymitch woke up slowly from a dreamless sleep.

It was so rare for him not to startle awake screaming his head off that he struggled with slumber for a couple of minutes, disoriented but warm and pleasantly sore. He stretched his arm across the bed, reaching for… _something_ he couldn't remember and only met lukewarm creased sheets.

The pillow and the sheets smelled like lavender and the mattress was too soft to be his.

He truly wasn't used to a peaceful rest anymore and it took him that long to remember the evening. Finnick and Chaff showing up at his house, dragging him out for a night out only to laugh and force him into that bar once they had spotted the speed soulmate finding sign tapped on the window… The resentment and annoyance he had felt, the pointlessness of the whole game…

He didn't understand what people found so funny about those events but that might be because his soulmate words had never been funny to him. They had always felt somehow disdainful and, on particularly dark days, _hurtful_.

His father had been a drunk, he had never wanted to follow in his footsteps, but the words had haunted him all his life, like a Damocles sword swinging over his head, and, later on, once the darkness had surrounded him so badly he couldn't take a breath without chocking, they had truly felt like fate was giving him permission. What was the point of resisting the siren's call when the words told him he would end up a liquor sponge anyway?

He propped himself on his elbow and looked around the dark bedroom with its unfamiliar shadows, searching for the woman whose smile had made his stomach clench so bad he had thought he was going to be sick. He had noticed her as soon as he had entered the bar. It would have been hard _not_ to, she had been the prettiest woman there and that red dress…

He sat up, the sheets and blankets slipping down to pool on his lap. She must have covered him afterwards… He hadn't meant to fall asleep. He _wouldn't_ have chosen to fall asleep. His nights weren't safe to share. The night terrors…

"Hey, it's me."

He startled and glanced around again at the sound of her voice but quickly realized the sound came from a half-closed door on his right. The bathroom probably. She hadn't turned the light on.

"I only _just_ saw your texts and your missed calls…" she was saying. "I am _so_ sorry to have worried you, Portia… I _should_ have told you I was leaving or sent you a text at least…"

She was on the phone, he deduced, and, given the strange brief pauses in her sentences, he guessed she was also smoking. He slowly lied back down, picturing her sitting on the edge of the no-doubt huge bathtub, balancing an ashtray on her knees…

The alarm clock on the left side of the bed – the side where the bedside table was the most cluttered so it must have been the one she preferred – told him it was close to one a.m. A little late to call someone but, he supposed, if her friend had really been worried…

"Oh, you have to tell me all about him!" she exclaimed, the easy cheer coming back to her voice.

She was a happy person, he had surmised despite the incredible amount of fighting they had done. He wasn't sure how to deal with a happy person. He considered himself grumpy and bitter and, most days, that suited him just fine. Happy people were chirpy and always in a good mood, and generally annoying.

Like Finnick.

There was a lot of humming and hushed chuckles and he rubbed his face, not quite sure what he should do now.

A part of him regretted rushing after her out of that bar but there was an instinct, the same instinct that had had him on his feet and running once the shock had worn off, that told him letting her go was the stupidest thing he could have done. Not only that but the thought of _losing_ her when he had just found her had been _painful_.

He had tried to walk away earlier. He had tried to walk away _several_ times. Something wasn't letting him.

 _Fucking_ fate.

"Did you sneak away while he was sleeping, you naughty _naughty_ girl?" Effie teased, sounding entirely delighted. "Yes, well…" she added after a long pause. "So did I." There were giggles next, ridiculous girlish carefree giggles that turned into that particular purring voice he had learned made him lose his composure very fast. "Oh, _that part_ was great. So very great…"

He smirked, his ego stroked. It never hurt a man to have his bedroom skills praised and the fact that she was telling that to her friends meant more than if she had told it straight out to him. You didn't lie to a close friend, you might lie to a lover you wanted to keep.

Did she want to keep him?

Did _he_ want to keep her?

"Well, you know what my soulmate words are…" she sighed and the cheer in her voice dimmed a little. "It was not… It was not entirely pleasant." There was a pause and he distinctively heard her blow out some smoke. "I am not sure…"

Haymitch didn't feel like listening on her private conversation anymore. He wasn't sure he wanted to hear what she had to say about him. He had been an ass at that bar, like he often was nowadays. He had been a bit drunk, not enough that his judgment had been impaired but enough to let himself feel justified in his dark mood.

Morons had paraded in front of him, offering more and more ridiculous first words, and then someone had cleared their throat and when he had looked up from his whiskey… He wasn't sure what had made him say it. Yeah, the make-up had been a bit too much, but… He had been playing the part of the bitter old drunk for so long, sometimes he was afraid he didn't know how to shed it off anymore.

He had hated his soulmate words at times, but hers couldn't have been more pleasant to look at. Not that she could _really_ look at them. Not without a mirror and a lot of twisting…

He slipped out of bed, careful not to make a sound.

She was still talking in the bathroom, giving her friend a detailed retelling of the finer points of the evening, and he couldn't help but cringe when he heard some of it. _You don't treat a girl like that_ , a voice whispered at the back of his mind, a voice that belonged to his mother.

There must have been some sort of motion sensor system because the moment he exited the bedroom, lights turned on in the long corridor. He followed it slowly, trying not to get lost in the penthouse she was living in. It was huge and he couldn't help but glance in the rooms he came across, looking for signs someone else was living there. It seemed far too big for someone alone.

Then again, his house was far too big too. Or at least he had thought so before stepping foot in her apartment. He considered himself a wealthy man, he had much more money than he knew what to do with – sometimes he thought he had _too much_ of it – and if he played his cards right, he would never need to work again, but whatever was on his bank account, it was clearly a fraction of what hers must have been like.

He was afraid of breaking something because everything looked overprice.

He gathered the clothes he had scattered earlier on his way to the living-room, musing that maybe walking naked in that place wasn't done, that she expected decorum or…

The lights turned on in the living-room the second he stepped foot in it. So much for discretion. He picked up the last of his clothes – his shirt and his coat – and stood there, unsure of what he should do. Generally, it was the moment of the night he would quietly sneak out on his one-night-stand.

Somehow, he sensed you could not have a one-night-stand with your soulmate.

And he wasn't sure he wanted to disappear and never see her again either.

But he also wasn't sure what you did when you had just slept with a girl you wanted to see again. His last steady relationship dated back from his late teens and had ended in tragedy. He had never really _been_ with a woman in a relationship way before and… Did soulmate count as a relationship? Did he want it to? Did he just leave and then call later the next day? Did he send flowers or….

His gaze had been wandering around the room while he agonized over what to do – it was _a nice_ room even with the expensive furniture, the colors were bright and welcoming, and the huge open kitchen made it feel cozier than he would have expected given the impressive volumes – and it fell on a tall framed poster on the further wall.

Despite himself, he shuffled toward it to get a better look. He knew the image, of course, _everyone_ knew the image. It was an advertisement poster for a famous brand of perfume. It had been plastered _everywhere_ a few years ago – on billboards, on the streets, on the glossy pages of magazines… There had even been some artsy commercial spots on TV… Even _he_ who couldn't care any less about overpriced perfume knew those ads because there hadn't been any avoiding them.

The model was wearing a loose backless white dress of Roman inspiration that dipped so low it barely covered the top of her ass, one strap fell down her left shoulder; her mouth, her eyelids and her straight blond hair were all painted a rigid gold. On the picture, she was sitting with her back to the camera, her hair trapped in its rigid case of gold lie a helmet left her face free, she was glancing over her shoulder, her bearing regal, her golden lips slightly parted, each bump of her spine on display… The picture was perfectly decent but it had an undeniable erotic feeling to it.

On all the posters he had seen before there was a tag line, _The Escort, dare to play_ or something equally ridiculous he couldn't remember.

There was no tag line on that poster, no brand logo or bottle of perfume, as if it came from the original film roll.

And maybe it did.

Because the woman on the poster, the woman everyone always associated with that _Escort_ perfume because she had been its face for almost a decade, that woman was Effie.

Effie.

Effie _Trinket_.

He knew the name because he knew the face. The same way you knew the names and faces of singers you didn't particularly like but who are played on all the radios. He knew the name and the face because sometimes, out of boredom and weariness, conversations between soldiers became dirty and, on long missions, you fantasized out loud about famous girls just to get a laugh or an approving comment from your teammates. He knew the name and the face because she had been the favorite fantasy of some members of his squad and he had seen more pages of lingerie magazines with her in it than he cared to remember at the moment – _hell,_ he _knew_ one of them had been tapped to one of the younger soldiers' locker's door even if he couldn't remember whose. He was even pretty sure that, once, in a desert, on a mission that had lasted months, he had used one of her pictures to have some quality time with his hand.

He knew the name and the face.

He just hadn't associated _Effie_ to _Effie Trinket_ and he hadn't associated _her face_ to _that_ face.

Trying to control his growing panic, he turned away from the poster and walked to the bay window that ran all the way through the living-room. The view over the city was breathtaking. They were in one of the highest buildings, people on the streets looked like ants, lights shone like beacons piercing the night… It was almost enough to make the city look pretty.

He had meant to leave that city.

At first he had stayed because his injury meant he needed a specialist at one very fancy hospital – and there had been _so many_ surgeries those first few months back on American soil, first to save his life, then reconstructive, then the long uncertain weeks where it had been unclear if he would need to forever remain attached to a bag to poop or if his guts could not only be sewed back together but _work_ again… He had spent so long in the hospital that he had simply been glad to be allowed a life outside of it even if it meant having to remain in an overpopulated city…

Then, when after months he had finally been cleared, he had stayed for Chaff because his former teammate had been having troubles adjusting to his missing hand. Then the two of them had met Finnick and… He had stayed. He had told himself it would be temporary, that he would relocate somewhere _far away_ where he could have trees, a clear sky and stars at night, where he wouldn't smell car fumes every time he wandered in the small square of green that passed as a garden… All his friends were there though and, while he cultivated his loneliness, he always ended up being glad for their meddling and their refusal to give up on him. He was also a little afraid that if he left he would truly lose the last of his sanity.

But he had _still_ been meaning to leave that city at some point, one day.

He touched his soulmate words, felt the rugged swollen scar that barred them, tried not to remember how her tongue had felt when it had ran over it earlier…

 _I am model, and a fairly famous one at that. Not only am I gorgeous, I am wealthy, smart enough and not quite as good at holding a grudge as I should be_ …

She had never said she was famous enough to star on the covers of gossip rags every two weeks, _wealthy_ probably didn't cover her fortune and…

What the hell was he still doing there?

There had been a mistake. Somewhere, somehow, there had been a mistake.

He couldn't be her soulmate.

Even if he had seen the words with his own two eyes, if he had kissed them and nipped a them, there must have been a trick. A _mistake_. They were complete opposite. He valued privacy above everything else, he _hated_ waste of any kind, loathed people who flaunted their money and he couldn't say he had any respect for models, actors and the likes.

Not to mention, he didn't have anything to give to someone who already had everything. He was a nobody from a small town in rural Virginia, a high school dropout without any degree who had earned money by completing dangerous secret missions for the government that amounted to little more than a series of assassinations. He had always regretted not getting his diploma, maybe even go to college… It had always been a sore point for him, even if he had always tried to compensate this lack of formal education by reading all the books he could find and self-teaching himself any skill he had deemed useful. It had always been a sore point but he had never felt its weight as clearly as he did at that moment, standing there in front of that bay window.

She had made fun of his grammar. He hadn't really paid attention to it at the time because he had been the one to taunt her about her posh turns of phrases first. But she had made fun of it and now he wondered if she had meant it as a joke or…

 _Do not worry I will teach you proper English in no time._

She must have been mortified to find out he was her soulmate, perhaps _ashamed_. Maybe that was what she was telling her friend right at that moment.

He had half-convinced himself of that and was already sneering in disgust when he turned and froze.

She was standing on the threshold – had probably been standing on the threshold for several minutes – and she was watching him.

She was still naked and he stirred at the sight of her.

How could he _not_? She was gorgeous.

 _More_ than gorgeous.

She was… She was _perfect_. Not just her body but the way she had refused to let him have the last word earlier that night, the temper that had flared once or twice and made her eyes shine that much brighter, the way her lips had pursed every time he had said something that had irritated her, the way they had stretched into a smile when he had said something that had pleased her, the sigh she had breathed out when he had entered her… She was perfect and he wanted her again. He wanted to lose himself in her, maybe even harder than before, to punish her for that feeling of inadequacy she had triggered…

"Are you leaving?" she asked. There was a touch of uncertainty in her voice but it was quickly swept away by her more usual cheerful tone. "It is alright if you wish to, naturally. You must have to work in the morning…"

"I don't work." he countered.

It sounded like an accusation, too aggressive. He hated fake people and he was starting to understand the cheer was just an air she gave herself. At least, until she flinched at his tone and slowly crossed her arms in front of her chest, betraying a vulnerability that wasn't reflected on her face. But then again, maybe she was good at wearing masks but he was good at reading body language. She hadn't been insecure at all about walking around in her birthday suit but one harsh word from him and she felt the need to cover herself.

She had taken off most of the make-up while she was in the bathroom. Gone were the fake eyelashes and the thick layer of eyeshadow, her face looked paler probably because she had taken off the foundation powder. The lipstick looked slightly smudged as if she had tried to wipe it off but hadn't quite succeeded and her mouth, as a consequence, was still a dark cherry red that made him think of a sweet red wine. Her face wasn't _bare_ though. She had applied a lighter amount of make-up and he wondered if she was _that_ shallow that she couldn't bear to show herself without it, even to a man who had just kissed her in her most private place.

"I see." she said, averting her blue eyes.

A part of him wanted to press the point, to _demand_ to know what it was she was seeing, if she believed him to be a lazy drunk, a waste of space, who intended to live off his soulmate's money.

She didn't look judgmental though, even with the big smile on her still crimson lips and the chirpy attitude that her hugging herself was negating. She looked a little apprehensive, _awkward_. She kept stealing glances at the clothes bundled under his right arm, the clothes he hadn't put back on yet.

"I've been discharged not so long ago." he added, making an effort to curb his voice into something less confrontational and berating himself for it. He was already making concessions. _Why_ was he making concessions when he wasn't even sure he wanted to get involved with this whole soulmate thing? "Well… It _was_ a while ago but I was injured so…"

Her gaze immediately darted to the scar and remained there for far too long, an unreadable emotion flashing across her face. Fear? Dread?

He might not have met her.

He had had the same thought when he had woken up, half delirious, in the hospital and had realized where exactly the injury was located. That the blade had sliced through the soulmate words – and his whole stomach with it – had almost felt like fate then.

Would she had felt it if he had died? Even if they had never met, would she had felt the atrocious pain legend said you felt when half your soul slipped away? Or was that something that happened only to people who let the soulmate bond settle and grow?

"Still." she said with that same indefectible cheer. "I cannot blame you if you want to leave. You must have a life to go back to."

He didn't have much of a life. He had a big empty house full of ghosts and bottles of liquor he could resist less and less. If he went home now he would drink until dawn to wash out the memory of that weird night.

His attention turned to the poster again, to her golden painted self.

She let out a small laugh that sounded a little strange. "You already thought me arrogant… What must you think now that you know I keep framed pictures of myself in my apartment?"

"I didn't recognize you." he admitted.

"I told you you were lucky." He heard the grin in her voice, the tranquil certainty that he was pleased by that turn of eventss because who wouldn't have been?

" _You'_ re not." he scoffed.

His bitterness was probably not what she expected and it probably wouldn't have been the reaction any man would have had if they had been gifted a famous gorgeous soulmate. He couldn't hide his self-loathing very well and it annoyed him even more because he knew she could tell and that made him feel _naked_ – and, yeah, he _was_ technically naked but he had no problem standing without clothes in front of her, but baring his soul was something else and it seemed that it was _bare_ on account of her being his _fucking_ soulmate and what not regardless of his wanting it or not.

She took a deep breath and his attention shifted back to her just in time to see her lower her arms, unconsciously exposing herself to his gaze – body and soul, so to speak. "The woman on that poster… It is not me." She paused and made a small face that was quickly replaced by one of those quick easy smiles. "I mean it _is_ obviously me but… Do you know how many hours people spend photoshopping these pictures before they become ads? They brighten my hair, whiten my teeth, thin my waist, make my eyes a little bigger…"

He looked at the picture again, not seeing it.

She must have understood his doubts because she waved her hand. "This one hasn't really been touched. Some adjustment to the lightning perhaps but the picture is one of the originals. I used to date the photographer, it was a birthday gift." She didn't linger on that little piece of information. "My point is… It takes hours to make someone camera ready, glamour is neither cheap nor easy, so it is no wonder you did not immediately recognize me. Besides, few people notice celebrities when they do not expect to see them or if they are not die-hard fans." She took a few tentative steps closer to him, visibly swallowing hard despite the smile that hadn't wavered. "The woman on that picture… She's a fantasy, Haymitch. She is not real." She reached out and he couldn't help but notice the quiver in her fingers. She barely brushed them against his arm. " _I_ am real."

He understood what she meant with a weird clarity that he immediately attributed to that _fucking_ bond. Was it already sinking into place? Was it already _there_? It wasn't like he was hearing her thoughts, it was just… An instinct. A strange new instinct that was attuned to _her_ and her alone.

Or maybe it was just her big blue eyes begging him to understand.

 _Don't be intimidated. Don't be fooled. See me. See_ me _._

And it was hard _not_ to see her when she was standing right next to him wearing nothing. He was half-hard again, just at the sight of her.

The tension that had strained his shoulders slowly loosened, it was probably visible because her smile became more genuine, a little less bright and a little more hesitant.

"Are you leaving?" she asked again, touching the rough fabric of his bundled coat.

Was it strange they were having that conversation naked and it wasn't even the most embarrassing part of it?

"Do you want me to go?" he almost challenged. Because he wouldn't blame her if she did. It would be easier. That way he could rage about her being a snobbish _bitch_ and move on without regret.

Something complicated flashed on her face before her features schooled themselves into something neutral, _detached_.

 _Fuck_ , but she wasn't as simple as she seemed and, _fuck,_ if it didn't draw him in.

Her feisty attitude had already more or less already sealed the deal but the obvious layers to her character… She was a mystery to uncover and…

 _And_ he had never wanted to burden himself – or burden someone – with that soulmate thing, he reminded himself firmly. Their meeting was a freak accident of chance and…

A freak accident. Because on this huge planet with its huge different countries, it was an accident that they would be in the same city – a city he had never learned to like but in which he had remained stuck for months – and ended up at the same speed soulmate finding event neither of them had wanted to attend, dragged by overbearing friends.

That didn't sound like an accident. It sounded like _fate_.

"It is your choice." She jutted her chin a little higher, like he had noticed she did when she wanted to make her point. "I will not force _anyone_ to stay with me. Not even my soulmate."

There was a confession in there, something important, but he was missing clues to unwrap the mystery.

"Do you _want_ me to stay?" He angled his body toward her, making it a real challenge now.

It felt like that strange dance in front of the bakery all over again. Trying to leave, trying to resist the pull… And in the end, caving and turning back, crashing into her hard because…

She didn't lose her composure or her calm, as false as he suspected it to be, she simply tilted her head to the side. "Don't _you_ want to stay?"

His temper flared but his irritation turned to amusement and, despite himself, he chuckled. "You think we're _ever_ gonna have a conversation that doesn't end up with us butting heads?"

He tossed his bundled clothes on the couch because it was obvious he wasn't going anywhere. Sure, he could get dressed, storm out, walk the long walk to Finnick's or Chaff's apartments and ask for a couch to sleep on for the night…. He would only end up tossing and turning and thinking about her and how soft her skin felt under his palms…

"I hope not." she huffed. "How _boring_ it would be otherwise." There was a twinkle of mirth sparkling in her eyes and she looked relieved. He hadn't noticed how tense she had been until her body relaxed. She grinned when he grabbed her hip and tugged her toward him, her teeth briefly grazing her bottom lip, maybe to keep the smiling in check. "Why, _hello_."

Her voice was teasing and he figured she was talking to the hardness poking her in the stomach. She was so much tinier without those monstrous heels she had been perched on that he almost felt the need to wrap around her, to be her human shield for the rest of their lives.

It was a sobering thought.

One he wasn't sure how to deal with.

He kissed her.

He kissed her because it was either that or saying stupid things he wasn't ready to acknowledge, not even to himself. He didn't believe in love at first sight, he didn't believe soulmates were so great and, on some days, he wondered if he believed in love _at all_.

His fingers clenched at her waist and she groaned into his mouth. He thought he might have hurt her – he was rough, he knew, maybe rougher than she was used to – but there was no softness when she grabbed his wrists. He expected her to push him away in annoyance, to tell him to be careful, she brought his hands to her breasts instead, locked her arms around his neck…

Still kissing her, he steered her toward the bay window.

She hissed when her back hit the cold panel of the glass.

For a moment, it was the bakery all over again.

He tore his mouth away from hers, placed a finger under her chin to tilt her head up… "Can someone…"

"No." she cut him off, a little impatient. She curbed the annoyance by sliding her leg against his impossibly slowly. Her thigh brushed against the side of his knee, then his own thigh and then it coiled around his waist and he instinctively pinned her harder to the glass, one of his hands finding her ass, very much intending to lift her up. "We are too high. There are no opposite building. We have complete privacy."

He should probably have worried about that _before_ since they had been standing there naked for a good amount of time anyway.

He stopped second-guessing. That confirmation was all he needed.

He dipped his head, retraced the line of her jaw with his mouth, bit down on the soft spot of flesh just under her ear, all the while his hands stroke and kneaded and squeezed in turn, learning the shape of her body, learning her responses, learning _her_ …

Her breathing increased… The angle wasn't quite good but he sneaked his forearm under her thigh, forced her leg higher to get better access… She was dripping wet already and when he started properly touching her, she let her head fall back against the glass with a whimper…

He kissed his way down her collarbone, short quick burning kisses that took him to her breasts… He loved her breasts, he had already decided earlier, he would spend _hours_ touching and kissing them if she let him. He loved her hair too. And the column of her neck. And the dip of her stomach. And the softness of her inner thighs. And the taste of her.

She was getting aroused fast and it turned him on. He barely realized he was rubbing himself against her in time with each of the strokes he gave her… He _did_ realize when she wrapped her hand around him though. Her fingers were still trembling, from pleasure or nerves he wasn't sure, but her grip was firm and experienced. It took some fumbling for her to learn the rhythm he preferred but when she started pumping him, he groaned and buried his face between her breasts and decided that if he could die there in that moment, he would die happy.

"Haymitch…" she whimpered, it was out of breath and frustrated. He had stopped stroking her. He flicked her clit with his thumb twice and then slipped his fingers into her. She clenched around them. Her grip became dangerously tight, almost painful, and she was panting.

He brushed his nose against her neck, bumped it on her jaw on its way to her ear.

"Easy, princess." he taunted. "Don't break the junk."

Her whole body was trembling now, coiled with the nearness of her orgasm…

He nibbled on her earlobe, keeping his hand absolutely still despite the cramp in his wrist.

"Are you going to _do_ something?" she hissed, giving him a hard stroke that wasn't entirely pleasurable. It wasn't entirely painful either.

"Maybe you've got to ask nicely." he retorted, stealing a kiss.

She was getting frustrated and she fought to turn her head away but he slipped his tongue in her mouth, kissed her like she would have liked him to _fuck_ her: hard, fast and dirty. She let go of him to lock her arms around his neck again, moaned against his lips.

"So?" he challenged, slowly twirling her nipple between his fingers with his free hand.

Her blue eyes were clouded with lust when they met his but they weren't unsure. They hadn't really done the power play thing earlier. The moment they had reached her apartment, they had been all over each other – _hell_ , they had been all over each other all the way there, bickering and then aggressively kissing and groping against whatever flat surface was closest – they hadn't talked, they hadn't really done anything more than get naked, briefly touch each other and then _fuck_ like their lives depended on it.

"I will have you begging too." she warned. "I _will_."

He smirked. He didn't even doubt her. "I don't beg, sweetheart."

"You will for me." she retorted.

Most girls would simply have said _please_ to get what they wanted, he wasn't asking for more, but _she_ obviously wouldn't hand over control that easily and that _thrilled_ him.

"You want me to make you come or what?" he insisted, pumping her twice to make his point – and keep her stimulated.

She keened with bliss, her nails – _sharp_ , far too sharp – dug in his shoulder and his nape and it was his turn to hiss.

"Please." she blurted out when he stopped again. " _Please_."

It didn't take much to make her come and when she did, she let out a small shrill cry that made him hide his smile in her neck. She was very vocal, his soulmate, he had noticed earlier already. He gently guided her leg back down, shook his hand a few times because his wrist was hurting and, when he found her slightly concerned gaze on him, he rolled his eyes.

"I'm fine." he grumbled. "Won't die from a cramp in the wrist."

"One would think men would be used to that." she mocked, batting her eyelashes.

In a swift move, he grabbed her under both thighs and lifted her up. She screeched and immediately wrapped her legs around his waist, scrambling on the window with her hands for purchase.

"What?" he taunted. "Not used to _that_?"

She rolled her eyes at him but there was a smile tugging at her lips. The moment she had recovered her balance, she was pumping him again. He didn't mind letting her set the pace because her breasts were _right_ _there_ and it kept his mouth busy.

"I need…" he muttered after a minute or two.

"Yes?" she murmured sweetly, _innocently_ in his ear and _damn her_ because she was going to make him _say_ it.

"I'm gonna _fuck_ you." It was not a question and he wasn't asking for permission. He pressed against her harder, blindly probing at her entrance since his hands were supporting her ass…

"Wait." she suddenly demanded.

He groaned and looked up at her. "I _ain't_ gonna beg, princess."

"No." She shook her head. "No, it isn't that. The condoms are in the bedroom…"

And so they were.

How had he forgotten about _that_? He had never _ever_ forgotten about that. Even drunk as a skunk he remembered.

Oh but he knew why it hadn't even registered as a priority… It was that _fucking_ soulmate thing all over again… It had felt so good earlier… So good to be buried inside her… Better than anything he had ever felt… He had felt… _Fuck_ , it was such a cliché but he had felt _complete_.

"Yeah." he answered, trying to clear his head.

"I am not opposed to stop using them but… Perhaps not on the first night?" she insisted, biting down on her bottom lip. "I…"

"No, no… You're right." he mumbled, briefly pressing his forehead against her shoulder. "I'm clean. I still have to go to the hospital every month for check-ups and stuff."

Not that it was relevant since it _was_ too early to even _think_ about not using condoms. He took safe sex to heart. And he never _ever_ wanted to risk an accidental pregnancy. _Never_.

"I do not think there is a problem but I have not been tested in a while." she admitted. "And I am not always… Sometimes I trust too easily."

She was eager to please rather, he mused, because if he had insisted he was pretty sure she would have relented and forgot about condoms whatsoever.

But at least she was honest about it.

She wasn't expecting him to step away from the window – or maybe she expected him to put her down first but he liked having her close too much, it felt too good – and she yelped again when he carried her away. She tightened her hold on him when he started striding down the corridor, muffling her giggles in his neck.

"Impatient, are we?" she teased.

He groaned in answer and adjusted his grip, feeling the strain in his abdomen. There was no risk of anything breaking anymore and the doctors kept encouraging him to find some physical activity but he had never wanted to bother and now he regretted it because even her light weight was causing pain.

She must have seen it on his face because she frowned, her amusement melting into concern. "Are you alright? I can walk, Haymitch, it…"

"I'm _fine_." he growled. "Do you _have_ to live in a _fucking_ maze?"

"It is not that big." she denied.

"It's bigger than my house." he scoffed, to distract himself from the strain that was threatening to make his arms shake. He wasn't going to drop her. He _wasn't_. She weighted less than the pack he had carried on treks through the jungle and his pride wouldn't recover from it.

"You have a house?" she asked, clearly interested by that small insight into his life. He had been less talkative than her.

He didn't really want to tell her about his sad story and he was glad to reach her bedroom. He tried to toss her on the bed but she was clinging to him so hard that all he ended up doing was tripping and they both fell on the creased sheets with a grunt for him and another yelp for her. He must have crushed the air out of her too because she let out a graceless _umph_.

He didn't dare move for a second but then she laughed and he relaxed. He loved her laugh. She unlocked her legs from around his waist and put her feet down on either side of his thighs, wriggling a little in her hilarity.

"Aren't things with your soulmate supposed to be _smooth?_ " she remarked.

He propped himself on his elbows so he could look down at her, a sulk on his face. "We can be smooth."

She shook her head, delight all over her face. "No, we cannot. We so _obviously_ cannot."

"I'm gonna show you smooth." he muttered, a little vexed and amused at the same time.

He planted a kiss between her breasts, another on her stomach and shuffled back to find the soulmate words half hidden by her bent leg. She had to spread her leg almost completely flat on the bed for anyone to see it properly. A part of him liked that it was in such an intimate spot, it was safe and protected.

She pulled him back up before he could taste her again but it was alright because he was so hard he was _throbbing_ with need and it was becoming painful.

"I want… _Please_." she whispered, reaching for the box forgotten on the bedside table.

"Thought you were going to make me beg?" he challenged smugly, watching her struggle to tear the square paper and get to the condom inside. He stopped being smug when she slowly rolled it on him. Trust her to make that move a sweet torture.

"Later, darling." she retorted, guiding him to her.

"Don't call me that." he complained but he could tell already that it was a lost battle, the same way sneaking out of her apartment had been.

Then, he was inside her and he stopped over thinking everything. Two powerful thrusts and he was buried deep and everything became so _simple_ … Her back arched, her nipples rubbed against his chest, his lips found the hollow of her throat…

When he started moving, he tasted _rapture_.

She was mumbling something and it took him a few seconds to make sense of the words through the blood rushing to his ears.

"Don't leave me, never leave me, don't leave me…" she kept repeating.

His answer was instinctive. He pounded into her harder, _faster_ …

"Never." he promised, biting down on her neck.

And it was a lie because soon he would come and he would have to pull out and this blissful sensation of having found _their place at last,_ of being _complete_ would fade away…

And beyond that…

Beyond that, he didn't know.

She came before he did. She crashed hard, her head tossed back, her eyes fluttering shut, her fingers clawing at his back… And then he followed, with a soft groan he couldn't swallow back, and it felt _so good_ that he remained slumped on her, completely boneless once he was spent, the aftermath of release making his limbs heavy and numb.

He was vaguely aware of being manhandled to the side after a few minutes and had the distant thought that she was stronger than she looked. He made a valiant effort to resist slumber and to help when she discarded the condom and pulled the sheets and blankets back up over them. She snuggled close to him and he automatically wrapped his arms around her.

He wasn't surprised she was a cuddler but he hated cuddling and he would only humor her for a moment, he mused, then he _would_ go because…

It felt so good to have her close… She was so soft and warm against his chest…

"Effie…" he muttered, alarmed at how distant his voice sounded. But even that wasn't enough to stop him from drifting off.

"Yes." she hummed and she sounded content if exhausted.

Maybe it was the soulmate bond taking its toll on their bodies. Maybe…

"Can't fall asleep…" he mumbled. "Not safe…"

Her hand slid down his chest and to his side, retraced the ugly scar with tenderness before settling over his soulmate words – _her_ words. "Of course, you are safe. I am with you."

Logically, that made zero sense because she was so small and cute and he doubted she would ever harm a fly…

But the soulmate words seemed to _tingle_ under her palm and, in his heart, he knew that it was the purest truth he had ever heard.

She would keep him safe.

So he stopped resisting and let her breathing lull him to sleep.

* * *

 _I know, I cannot simply remain cracky, I have to bring angst into everything but HEY have you met Haymitch? :p I hope you like this. I kinda want to write more in this universe so let me know your thoughts!_


	3. Chapter 3

Despite the exhaustion, Effie woke a few seconds before the alarm rang, like always. She hit the snooze button but not before music blared from the small loudspeakers hidden around her room like it did every morning. She turned the sound system off and buried deeper in her nest of blankets. Her body felt sore but in a pleasant way and the bone-deep exhaustion she still felt after almost a whole night of sleep was the good kind. She reached behind her for the male body she expected to find but only encountered still warm empty sheets.

She forced her eyes open, her heart suddenly racing.

Was Haymitch gone?

The dull echo of flushing in the en-suite bathroom answered the question. It was followed by the soft sound of water splashing in the sink, longer than she would have expected.

She stretched her body from her toes to her fingertips before letting her limbs heavily fall back. She reached for the phone she had tossed on the bedside table after having hung up with Portia the previous night and quickly cancelled her usual training session. She wasn't in any state to exercise or let her personal trainer put her through hell. Brutus was never very understanding of her late nights out, his job was to keep her in shape and he took it to heart.

She had just finished checking and clearing most of her schedule when the bathroom door opened, revealing her soulmate. Would that ever get any less weird? To think that this man was half of her soul? Or was it _twin_ of her soul? She wasn't even sure of the appropriate terminology. She could have been less lucky. She had heard of extremely beautiful people like herself getting extremely ugly people for a soulmate. Haymitch was anything but ugly.

It was early still, barely past dawn, and light was trickling through the windows since she hadn't bothered rolling down the blinds the previous night. It hit his body _just_ right.

She had an eye for bodies. She always had some interest in art and while she preferred to sketch dresses and suits, she had attended some art classes from time to time… She had learned to study a naked body in a glimpse, spot the particularities that made it unique.

Haymitch had a very nice body but it was painfully obvious it had been mistreated recently.

It wasn't just the huge scar she couldn't help but stare at or even the dozens of smaller, paler white lines, it was the obvious muscle loss – the consequence of his injury, she supposed – and the abs that were softening without yet turning into fat. He looked slightly underfed too and she wondered if he bothered eating properly. Or even taking proper care of himself.

He hadn't said much about himself since they had met but the few he had let slipped out had told her he didn't love himself a lot.

He hesitated, his eyes darting from her to the alarm clock and back. "You need to get up?"

His voice was a little rough from sleep and she found herself smiling because she liked the sound. She almost regretted not waking up to that voice whispering in her ear.

"No. I cancelled." she answered. "Come back to bed."

After another brief hesitation, he did. And instead of walking _around_ the bed to get back to the free side, he climbed over her like it was perfectly civilized behavior. Since it brought him so much closer to her, she didn't mind. The moment he was back under the blankets, she snuggled against his side with a sigh of relief.

A part of her worried it made her look needy or clingy but she couldn't _quite_ bring herself to care because she _needed_ it. And given the way he immediately wrapped his arms around her, she wasn't the only one.

There was something so _soothing_ to being close to him…

Was it the soulmate bond? She didn't know much about it, she had never been interested enough to learn, she had never thought she would _need_ to.

"Did you sleep well?" she hummed, pressing a kiss against his shoulder.

She was trying hard _not_ to feel awkward even though they were virtually strangers on which an intimacy had been forced. Sex had been great – _more_ than great – sex had been easy. It was when they tried to talk that it became halted and complicated.

And why wouldn't it be? There was a code to this. One-night-stands didn't usually linger to talk the following morning and if there _was_ to be more in the morning, the sex was usually predated by a date that at least covered some of the basics and offered for more topics of conversation to be explored. They were in a strange in-between.

"Yeah…" he answered and he actually sounded surprised by it.

He tentatively coiled a strand of her hair around his finger, let it bounce back in place… She tried not to worry too much about how she looked. She had applied some lighter make-up while she was talking to Portia on the phone and her hair had looked alright, but that had been before wild sex and a whole night of sleeping. Ideally, she would have slipped away while he was still asleep to make sure she didn't look a fright but there was no discreetly doing that now. And he hadn't yet called her another clown name so… _Still_ , it would have been a shame to repulse her soulmate so early in their acquaintance, perhaps she could pretend she wanted to use the bathroom and…

He dropped his hand from her hair, loosened his hold on her body and turned his face away from her, toward the window. His voice turned hard. "It ain't safe, sleeping with me. If we… If we do this again, don't let me fall asleep."

 _If_.

What a small terrible word…

"Why wouldn't it be safe?" she asked, to cover her growing anxiety.

She wasn't certain where she wanted this to go but she was pretty sure she didn't want him to leave just yet, that she wouldn't be able to bear it without great heartbreak – as ridiculous as it was since they had only met less than twenty-four hours earlier and since they hadn't been able to go ten minutes without bickering. The idea that morning was there and it implied they would have to part ways soon was already overwhelming, the thought that she might never see him again…

He sighed. It was a long heavy sigh. She might have thought he was annoyed by her questions if that strange new instinct that was quickly growing inside her hadn't whispered to her that it had more to do with the weight he was carrying on his shoulders. Perhaps he didn't want to burden her. Perhaps it was about things you wouldn't tell someone on a first date, never mind on a one-night-stand and he wasn't sure how to confess them.

"Night terrors." he spat after a silence so long she had almost filled it with platitudes. His arms completely fell off from around her, the loathing in his voice was obvious. The _weariness_.

He was a weary man, her soulmate, tired all down to his soul.

She saw that.

She saw a possible space for her there, assuming he let her take it. She could help. She was good at cheering people up. She was an optimistic person, always had been, and she refused to let anyone be grim on her watch. She could chase his melancholia away, she knew she could, if only he would let her.

"Night terrors…" she repeated slowly, _softly_ , as if it was the name of a monster about to pounce crouched in the corner of the room. She knew what the term meant, of course, it was self-explanatory really, but she wasn't quite certain what it _encompassed_. "Are we talking somnambulism or…"

"Nightmares." he cut her off in a cold sharp voice that told her he was making an effort by talking about it, by _explaining_. "So bad I can't wake up. Don't know what's real and what's not anymore. Can be dangerous if anyone's around."

"Dangerous how?" she insisted, forcefully dragging his arm back around her because she could feel the tension in his body. It looked like he was about to bolt and run away and she wasn't going to let him.

"Could hurt you." His voice was cold and mocking, designed to scare her.

And, for a moment, it worked.

"It makes no sense." she huffed. " _Why_ would you hurt me?"

He tried to struggle free of her attempts at forcing him to hold her but she was stubborn – more stubborn than him, she was determined to prove it – and, in the end, she pinned his legs down with her right one. He finally turned his head away from the window to look back at her and she answered his irritated look with a bright innocent smile.

The anger and humiliation battling in his grey eyes subsided a little, _softened_.

"Wouldn't know it was you." he grumbled.

"Oh…" It made more sense now. She bit her bottom lip in thought and then gave him a small shrug, a rare gesture on her part even though he couldn't know that. "Well, there is an easy solution to that, isn't there? If you are having a nightmare, I will simply keep my distance…"

He stared at her hard. "You don't get it. It ain't _just_ a nightmare."

"How do other people take care of you when you have these night terrors?" she asked, sitting up but taking care of keeping her leg where it was, tossed over his. She took the sheets with her, pinned them to her chest.

He scowled. "Just told you I don't sleep with people."

For all his scowling, he still tugged a little on the sheet. She dropped it without making a fuss, not even trying to control her smile when his eyes immediately darted to her breasts. His gaze caressed her chest, the length of her neck, her stomach…

"Someone _must_ have told you you were suffering from them. Or you had an accident for you to be so adamant it is dangerous." she argued. "You _must_ know how someone could best help you when something like that happens."

He pulled harder on the sheets until more of her was exposed. "Sure. They can do the smart thing and never let me fall asleep on them."

"But I like you on me." she purred. "Asleep and otherwise."

His eyes darted up, straight into hers, and he licked his lips. "Sweetheart…"

"How do I help?" she insisted, innocently retracing the curve of his hipbone with the tip of her finger.

He rolled his eyes. "You stay away. You don't let me hurt you 'cause _that_ …" He shook his head and the spark of desire in his eyes dimmed into bitterness again. He looked at the window once more. "It's better if you don't see it, trust me. Ain't exactly my best look. It can be scary."

"Oh, darling… It takes a lot more than nightmares, as impressive as they must be, to scare me." she challenged.

She expected taunting and all she got was a snort and a smirk. "You don't have the good sense to be afraid of much, yeah?"

She thought that over for a second, debated between offering an easy jibe or the truth, and, in the end, concluded that he had taken a step toward her by talking about night terrors and that it was only fair that she took one too.

"Oblivion." she whispered.

"What?" His frown made him look older. There were wrinkles at the corners of his eyes and she wondered if it was his days as a soldier that had put them there.

She looked down at her hands, ran the pad of her index on her thumbnail to feel the smooth layer of her nail polish. It comforted her.

"Oblivion." she repeated quietly. " _That_ scares me. Not being remembered by anyone. Being forgotten."

She waited for the mocking comment and, when it didn't come, she tentatively looked up to find him watching her, a thoughtful look on his face.

"Funny." he said in a flat tone that wasn't very amused.

"What is?" she asked.

"You're afraid of it and I've been looking for it at the bottom of bottles." he replied.

 _Was_ it funny? Or was it fate?

They studied each other in silence for a while, each contemplating what that might mean. Effie hated silence though, it made her uncomfortable, anxious, and she was already full of energy like always so early in the morning so she didn't want to get anymore jittery.

"Well." She forced some cheer into her voice, tried to cut through the weirdness of the moment. "Perhaps I am meant to teach you to be afraid enough of it that you will stop looking."

She used the leg that was tossed on his lap – and that was quickly becoming numb – to sit herself on top of him properly.

She didn't remain there for more than a couple of seconds.

She didn't even have time to yelp.

In a flash, she was flat on her back, he was on top of her, her wrists were pinned over her head and his hand was around her throat, _squeezing_.

The worst, maybe, was the look of horror that crossed his face. He let go of her throat and her wrists as if her skin _burned_ him and he _would_ have bolted out of the bed for sure then if she hadn't quickly locked her legs around his waist.

He froze.

She made very, very sure to keep her voice detached. "I am going to go on a limb here and guess you are either into control fantasies or you do not like not being on top."

He stared at her for a while, confusion and shame and a dozen of other emotions he wasn't hiding as well as he probably thought he was battling on his face. In the end, he scoffed. "You _really_ don't have _any_ good sense. You should be halfway across the room by now."

"Perhaps I don't." she retorted. "Perhaps that is why I need you."

His features turned into a scorn. "You _don't_ need me. What would you need me for? You've got everything!"

"No." she murmured, tentatively brushing his too long hair back. "No, I don't have everything."

He puffed and took a deep breath and puffed again, clearly torn between two instincts. She could relate, she had been battling with that herself ever since she had met him. It was fight or flight, stay or go… Except the brand new instinct that dictated them to stay was imperious and very difficult to deny.

Slowly, impossibly slowly, his body relaxed, his weight gradually pinned her to the mattress – and that felt _good_ , more than good – and he cupped her cheek, propping himself on his other elbow so he wouldn't entirely crush her. She leaned into his hand. His palms were calloused and she had been surprised by how much she liked that.

"I do not mind anything." she offered. "In the bedroom, I mean. Well, I do not like being choked but I am open to discussing it. Whatever you want, you can have… If that means dominating me, so be it."

She was too eager to please, she knew. She had tried most of everything, often to cater to the desires of lovers who had ended up rejecting her or using her to their own ends. She loved too easily, she had been told many times, and love, in her opinion, meant doing whatever you could to satisfy your partner. Love, in short, was foolish and often ended with tears. Love was not something she trusted readily.

The way he was looking at her…

She wasn't sure if it was awe or sadness. The idea that he could be sad for her was vexing and his silence was starting to make her feel self-conscious. She had the distinct feeling he was thinking she was easy or promiscuous or… She flushed and pursed her lips, averting her eyes.

"Maybe you _do_ need me." he grumbled. "You often say that kind of things to guys you just met?"

It was like a _slap_.

"Do not dare _judge_ me." she hissed. But what else was she expecting from a man who had compared her to a clown the second he had met her? To a man because of whom her soulmate words had brought her a lifetime of humiliation? Yes, the words were easily hidden and that was a small mercy but there were situations – _intimate situations_ – where they had been on display. How many of her previous lovers had known that she was fated to a soulmate who wouldn't respect her? How could she demand respect from _them_ after that? How many of them had made a joke of the words, forcing her to laugh with them because it was either making light of it or crying?

She tried to push him away but he was a little too good at keeping her still. He only had to rearrange his body to have her pinned there, at his mercy.

"Hey, hey, hey… _Easy_." he demanded. She didn't stop struggling immediately when it became obvious she wouldn't be able to get him off her without his cooperation. She couldn't just submit that easily. So she pouted and glared at him and that only made him smirk. Slowly, he released his restrictive hold but stayed exactly where he was, on top of her. "Alright, sweetheart, first thing first, I ain't into whatever BDSM stuff you're imagining… I ain't a control freak."

"That is _so_ patently obvious right now." she deadpanned.

It only made him smirk more but he soon turned serious again. "You know what you said about the condoms yesterday?"

"That I am not as careful as I should be?" Was he going to toss _that_ back in her face now? Call her a slut, perhaps? She wasn't sure it would be an improvement from being called a clown.

"No." he sighed. "That… That maybe we could go without but not on the first night. Yeah?"

She pouted. "Technically, this _still_ counts as the first night and you are not making me willing to negotiate right now."

"No…" he said again, clearly getting frustrated by her lack of understanding. "I mean… It's like that. For you to get on top. For me, I mean." He stopped, let out an annoyed breath and… "I mean…"

"Yes, I understand." she interrupted, relaxing a little. "You need to trust me more."

Relieved, he nodded. "It ain't about you. It's…"

"Like the night terrors." she surmised.

"Yeah." he admitted. He cupped her cheek again, a bit hesitantly. "I ain't always… I can't control myself sometimes. There's stuff that triggers… I don't wanna hurt you so it's better you know… Don't get on top of me _without_ letting me know first." He winced. "As a rule, _don't_ startle me. I _don't_ wanna hurt you. I just… Sometimes it's… It's like a reflex. I can't…"

He stopped talking, his cheeks a little red, his pain and his fears so plain she could almost _feel_ them like a dull echo in her chest. She covered his hand with hers, her anger fading with the need to soothe his worry.

He had been hurt.

Badly and repeatedly.

He wasn't meeting her eyes anymore. He wasn't exactly shying away either, there was a defiant tilt to his chin, as if he was waiting for her chase him away, to decide he was too much of a burden or to finally listen to what he had been telling her since the previous night: that she deserved better.

He believed that, she could see it.

"Does my mouth on your dick count as me being on top?" she hummed, faking deep thinking. "Because, I suppose, if one wants to be technical my head _would_ be on your lap." The vulgarity when she had only ever been so proper with him had the desired effect and he looked up at her with disbelief. She batted her eyelashes, praying that the light layer of make-up she had applied in the middle of the night hadn't smudged everywhere and that she wasn't currently impersonating a panda trying to seduce him. "I _did_ promise to make you beg, did I not?"

She wasn't expecting him to refuse the offer and he didn't even try to protest or resist when she pushed him on his back. She made sure to remain a bit on the side, not to cover him completely since that made him uncomfortable. Once she was certain he wasn't about to snap again, she started exploring like she hadn't yet been able to.

She started by running her fingers on his chest, tracing random patterns, playing with the short and pale chest hair… That was a novelty of sort, her lovers usually preferred to keep their chest waxed. There was an area around the scars were the hair simply disappeared and she wondered if it would ever come back or if the skin had been too badly damaged. She didn't linger there, bringing her fingers back up to his nipples, retracing them…

Haymitch sucked in a breath and she didn't try to hide her grin. She was going to enjoy this.

She bowed her head, darted her tongue out to tease the hard buds…

" _Fuck_ , sweetheart…" he groaned.

"That is the idea." she chuckled. "Be patient."

"Patient ain't really my thing." he grumbled.

She wasn't surprised to feel his hand on her back, running up and down her spine, ending up on her ass… She let him grope her while she learned the shape and taste of his chest. She also let him tentatively run his fingers through her hair when she started kissing her way down.

She stopped on his mangled soulmate words, she had licked them the previous night, she simply kissed them then, daring to show a little more tenderness. His stomach rippled as if he was trying to suck it in and she looked up, keeping her head close to it, her mouth a hair away from his scar… "Does it still hurt?"

His face was unreadable, his fingers tangled a little in her curls… "Sometimes."

She didn't ask anymore. She didn't ask how it had happened or how bad it had been. It would have spoiled the mood and they had made enough confessions for one morning. She simply noted to be extra careful when she touched him there and continued her way down, nibbling at each of his inner thigh in turn, avoiding the area he wanted her to touch…

He was hard and curling toward his stomach when she finally caved to the harder grip he had on her hair.

"I do not mind some tugging but pull my hair too hard and I will bite." she warned playfully. She didn't give him time to think it through. She pinched his head and gave him a long lick that had him breathing even harder than he already was.

She made it a good show because she knew it was half the fun. She didn't know yet what he liked and what would drive him crazy so she experienced, tried a couple of her tricks… She was very good at this and there was no complain.

"Effie…" he mumbled after a few minutes.

She hadn't need the warning, it was obvious he was about to come. She squeezed his thigh and took him deeper in her mouth, silently letting him know it was alright. This time, it was definitely _awe_ on his face. Then, pleasure took him and his eyes almost rolled _back_ with the strength of it.

As she swallowed and tried not to choke because there was nothing less sexy in her opinion, she wondered if it was the same for him as it was for her. The sex, with him, had felt so much… _more_ than it usually was. Everything had felt enhanced.

She waited until his hips had stopped thrusting and he had softened to let him slip out of her mouth. She placed a last soft kiss on the scarred soulmate words – she could tell already that it was going to be a favorite spot of hers – and got pulled upward.

The kiss was almost brutal and his tongue slipped in her mouth before she could think it through. She might have worried about morning breath if she hadn't quickly determined he would only be able to taste himself on her tongue. As for him, he tasted like her mouthwash and it made her smile into the kiss that he had taken advantage of being in the bathroom to rinse his mouth.

You didn't make sure you didn't have morning breath if you didn't want to see someone again…

She was so pleased she let him roll her on her back and barely reacted when his mouth left hers to roam on her jaw and then lower… She only understood what he was planning to do when his mouth reached her stomach and she immediately touched his shoulder to stop him.

"It is alright…" she whispered. "You do not have to…"

"Want to." he replied.

He had already briefly gone down on her the previous night in his quest to find her soulmate words, not long enough for her to come, but it _had_ been enough for her to know she would if he kept at it.

"Haymitch, don't." she insisted, tugging harder on his arm.

He paused uncertainly. His nose nuzzled her lower belly and he placed his big hand on her hip before looking up at her, confusion writing on his face. "Why? You liked it last night."

Given a choice, she would have lied but she felt, deep down, that it would be only too easy for them to misunderstand each other and she didn't want him to think she had been faking.

"I need a shower." she offered honestly.

He studied her a second and then rolled his eyes. "It's fine."

She squeezed his arm. "No, it is not. After last night… I feel gross."

Not something she liked to admit to her lovers but she refused to let herself be self-conscious and she jutted her chin a little higher. Condoms might make things a little less messy but she still badly needed to wash – another thing she would have done if she had woken up before him.

He studied her a little longer and moved back up with a sigh. "Just to be clear, your problem's with my mouth being down there, yeah? How about my hand?"

He was pouting like a child denied a particularly shiny toy and she couldn't help but chuckle. She planted a kiss on his mouth and she chuckled harder when he chased after her lips.

"I am fine for now." she promised. "I sucked you off because I wanted to, not to get something out of it."

He licked his lips at the words ' _suck you off'_ , his eyes darted to her mouth… "Alright."

There was a touch of regret in his voice as if he would really have enjoyed making her come – and to be honest, she would have too. Later, she told herself, there would be time later.

With a last kiss, she slipped out of his arms and out of the bed. Her legs were far less steady than she had planned and it took her a second to get her balance. She strutted to her bathroom like she would have walked down a catwalk, making sure to swing her hips just right, keeping her eyes on the en-suite door… She might not have been sure about the make-up or her hair but her body… She took _religious care_ of her body and it was perfect. She knew just what effect it could have if she used it right.

"Are you watching me?" she asked, her tone light.

She knew he was, she could feel his eyes roaming on her body, exactly like in the bar the previous night. His stare was hot.

"Worse views." he mocked.

Her lips stretched into a grin. "Are you _joining_ me?"

"Maybe." he answered.

"Give me a minute." She tossed him a teasing glance over her shoulder and then disappeared in the bathroom. She closed the door firmly shut and quickly relieved herself, hoping he wouldn't come in at that point because that would kill any possible romance for sure. When she finally checked her reflection in the mirror, she cringed at the slightly smudged make-up. She wiped her face off, immediately reaching for waterproof mascara…

Her hand was covered by a bigger one before she could grab it, the box of condoms was placed on the edge of the sink – it was good to know he was planning ahead, she supposed – and an arm sneaked around her waist, dragging her back against a firm chest. She met Haymitch's eyes in the mirror with a confused frown – and maybe some irritation since her face was bare; didn't he know when a lady asked you for a minute you waited for her to call you before going in?

"You don't need that _shit_." he mumbled. "You're gorgeous."

It was nothing no one hadn't told her before. Of course, she was gorgeous, she was a famous model… But without artifices? To be fair, she didn't remember the last time she had let someone who wasn't a member of her prep team see her without make-up, certainly not a lover… But still she couldn't ever remember anyone telling her plain bare face that she was gorgeous or that she didn't need the make-up. _Everyone_ needed the make-up. Even the most beautiful woman in the world needed make-up.

" _Gorgeous_ is an improvement from calling me a clown." she deflected because she wasn't sure what else to say.

He had the good taste to wince.

He pressed a kiss on her shoulder. His stubble itched. She wasn't sure why she was finding the contact so arousing, she was pretty sure she had stubble burn all over her body.

"Just… You're so _fucking_ beautiful… Don't see why you need all that stuff…" He shrugged.

"You are not a fan of make-up." she mocked, a little bitter because of those words branded on her inner thigh.

"Ain't a fan of _fake_." he corrected slowly. "If you're putting that on for my sake, don't bother. I like you better without all that crap."

"Well, I like _you_ better _sober_." she retorted defensively. It was her turn to wince when he flinched. His arm loosened around her waist and she grabbed it before he could move away. "I am sorry. I am getting old and beauty is a sensitive subject for me."

He looked at her hard and she had the feeling he was trying not to let his temper flare.

"Old." he scoffed after a couple of seconds. "You can't be older than…" He paused in thought and then shrugged. "My words appeared when I was five so you've got to be twenty-five. How's that old?"

It was old for her profession but she didn't want to go into that right then. She had honestly been surprised when he had confessed he hadn't recognized her the previous night. It was understandable he hadn't immediately put her name on her face but later on, once they had reached her apartment… She had thought he had by then. She was strangely grateful he hadn't though because it made that whole meeting seem more genuine. A lot of people would have thanked fate for being her soulmate, she had connections, money, fame… Being her soulmate would meant an instant access to all of that, to stardom even. Haymitch didn't seem to care at all, on the contrary he had almost looked _upset_ standing there in front of that poster.

She wondered if it was too much for him. It was too much for some people. The press hounding them, the objectification she suffered from, the stress of watching the contracts and the propositions slowly dwindle down…

Haymitch was still watching her in the mirror, waiting for an answer that she didn't want to give. She turned around and locked her arms around his neck, maneuvering him toward the big shower in the corner.

"Weren't we about to take a shower?" she hummed before kissing him.

His lips were unyielding and, for a second, she thought he would insist. But that strange connection she attributed to the soulmate bond exploded again in the kiss and he soon let himself get distracted.

They kissed and fooled around in the shower, covering each other's body in so much soap that there was foam up to their ankles… Because he was stubborn, he touched her until she came. Because she was no less stubborn, she reciprocated.

"I am not sure we are doing an outstanding job at washing up." she joked.

"Hope you don't have a hot water limit." he snorted, smearing some more shower gel on her to clean up the proof of that last round.

It was too hard to resist the urge of kissing him and she didn't even try. She kissed him and let her hands explore his back while his learned her curves… She wasn't sure how long they played like that, making-out like teenagers…

Still, she giggled in his neck when she felt him getting hard again. "You have _stamina_."

"Usually not that much anymore." he grumbled, not quite happy to admit it. "Must be that soulmate thingy…"

"The bond?" she whispered, her amusement fading a little. "I am not sure… What should we expect?"

He shook his head in ignorance. "You think it's gonna get less… intense?"

She wasn't certain if he meant the sex or everything else but she licked her lips and forced a smile. "I am not complaining about the intensity. It feels too good." She wrapped her hand around him, having a sense of what he liked by now. "And if it is to fade, we should make the best of it."

It was a good thing he had thought about bringing the box of condoms.

He pinned her against the glass wall of the shower and she briefly wondered what it was with them and glass surfaces… When he tried to lift her up though, he groaned and dropped his forehead on her shoulder, breathing out slowly between his teeth and placing both hands on the wall to steady himself.

"Are you alright?" she immediately worried, gently rubbing her hand up and down his nape.

He had scooped her up without problem the previous night but she had noticed he was straining when he had been carrying her to the bedroom.

"Yeah. _Yeah_ …" he said after a minute, pressing a kiss against her shoulder and then her neck, his hands came back on her body. He sounded irritated. At himself. "Haven't been doing much since…" Her hand drifted down his stomach and to his scarred soulmate words, silently finishing his sentence for him. "I'm fine." he said again. "Out of shape but fine."

She chased the bitter edge of his words with a kiss under his ear. "It is probably wiser to keep our feet on the floor anyway. It _is_ slippery."

His hands found her hips and, for a second, he seemed to hesitate. She let him set the pace, let him have the control he seemed to so desperately need… When he gave a gentle push, she turned around without question, braced herself against the wall and even went as far as wriggling a little with a teasing glance over her shoulder.

He looked half-confounded and half in awe again. She supposed most women opposed to that position, particularly on a first night-slash-morning. She didn't care.

His smirk was almost fond. "I said you're perfect yet, princess?"

"A few times." She looked back at the wall and grinned. "But do not let that stop you from saying it again."

"Don't let it go to your head." he joked.

And then his fingers were gripping her waist and he entered her in one powerful thrust, without warning, and she let out a cry of surprised pleasure that made him chuckle. The chuckles infuriated her but there was more urgent than butting heads with him at that moment – like chasing her release.

That round was short and rough, almost brutal…

When he came with a soft groan, almost a whole minute after her, and bowed his head over her back, her legs and arms were killing her from the strain of remaining in that position. She didn't complain though, not even when he took a good look at her and groaned again. "You're gonna bruise…"

He was gentle when he helped her straighten up and turn her around so she was facing him again. There was a look of dismay on his face as he stared at the reddish marks his fingers had left on her hips. There would be more bruises than that, she already knew, and a few scratches too.

"I mark easily." she dismissed, tossing her arms around his neck and leaning in for a kiss, eager to bask in the afterglow with him.

He drew back, his hands coiling around her elbows to keep her away. "Should have been more careful…"

His distress wasn't faked or overplayed to score sympathy points. He looked upset. _Really_ upset.

And it also _really_ wasn't worth it.

"Haymitch." she said firmly and his eyelids fluttered a few times before he finally met her eyes. He looked a bit dazed and it soon morphed into the same urge to flight she had seen earlier in the bedroom when he had wrapped his hand around her throat. She tightened her embrace, refusing to let him run. "You did _not_ hurt me. I am _fine_. I just mark easily. _Honestly_."

One of his hands remained coiled around her elbow even as he reached for the tap with his other one, turning the water off. He didn't step out of the stall though. With a long deep breath, he leaned forward until their foreheads were pressed together.

"I meant what I said last night, you know…" he mumbled. "You'd be better off without me."

She pursed her lips and gently ran her fingers in his hair. She was less gentle when she tugged a little so he would look up. She kept her voice firm. "And I meant what I said when I told you _you_ would not be."

There had been a vow in there. She hadn't been aware at the time but she was now. He needed her. So badly it wasn't even funny. He needed her and his soul called to hers and she didn't know if it was fate or chance or something else but she knew that now that she had found him she never wanted to lose him.

He shook his head, almost begging her to understand. "I'm not a good man, sweetheart…"

Bad men, she thought, never warned other people that they were bad. Good men who thought they were bad on the other hand… And what was even his definition of the terms? Was _she_ a good person? She had never hurt anyone physically but she had sometimes destroyed people's reputation on a whim or for her own gain. She had made and unmade stylists, make-up artists and photographs without any regard for their wellbeing… She was ambitious, self-centered and vain… But she also always accepted to do events for charity and gave them money, she tried to promote younger stylists when she could and she would have done anything for a friend in need. How reductive to try and fit people in small cases as _good_ and _bad_.

She hated cases. She had spent too long trying to define her sexuality to linger too long on labels.

However, she didn't launch herself in an explanation she suspected would fall on deaf ears. He would not believe her. And she didn't know him well enough to convince him yet. All she had was a gut feelings and this strange new overwhelming instinct.

"Good men…" she opposed slowly. "…are overrated."

And that was her final opinion on the subject.

* * *

 _soooo I did add a third part and I am planning on at least a fourth but let's face it, I think there will be a few more... Did you like it? Let me know your thoughts!_


	4. Chapter 4

_Good men are overrated._

Haymitch turned those words over and over in his head, mulling them over as he took a sip of his coffee and tried to shoulder through the returning awkwardness.

They had gotten dressed after the shower. Well, Effie had started getting dressed and he had given her space, trekking to the living-room to put his own clothes on, wondering if that was the moment she would politely show him the door, _worrying_ a little that this whole weird parenthesis was over… But when she had waltzed in the living-room, wearing a short pink wrap dress that would have looked business like if not for the color, her hair straightened and pulled up in a high ponytail, she had simply smiled and asked if he wanted some coffee. The hairstyle and the style of the dress were too strict for her, he had decided, but the smile made that feeling go away.

So there they sat now, on either side of the kitchen counter that marked the separation between kitchen and living-room – even if he was pretty sure there _was_ a dining-room somewhere in that gigantic apartment – drinking their coffee lost in their own thoughts, letting the awkwardness slowly slip back in.

The coffee was too strong for him. He liked his with a lot of milk and sugar, almost white, and would pick tea over it every time – to Chaff's eternal dismay and the endless mocking of his various squads over the years. It figured she liked hers bitter and as black as could be.

She had picked a stool on the living-room side so she was facing the kitchen and he was facing the bay windows and the rest of the place. The view from the bay windows was even more impressive in plain daylight and was almost enough to reconcile him with how huge that place was, the view definitely made the ridiculous amount of space worth it. He stared at the bay window while she stared at her coffee.

At some point, her phone buzzed and she picked it up mechanically. The case was pink with glittery specks of gold and there was a small shiny plastic crown on top. He spared a thought for his own phone, case-less and scratched beyond repair because he always forgot not to put it in the same pocket as his keys. The phone had been glued to her hand since she had left the bedroom. It had been glued to her hand at that bar the previous night too.

He didn't need to wonder if she was one of those people who spent half their day looking at a screen, he already knew she was.

Her long nails clicked against the screen when she unlocked it and checked the message she had just gotten. Haymitch took another sip of his coffee and wished he had something to spike it with because maybe then he'd have been able to get over how out of place he felt sitting in that spotless chrome kitchen.

She clucked her tongue in irritation and took another sip of her coffee.

"Problem?" he asked because he couldn't take any more of that silence. It would have been easier if they had still been naked and in bed. Sex had made it a little too easier to relax, to _talk…_ That, right then, felt forced.

She looked up in surprise, as if she had forgotten he was sitting there sometimes during her furious typing of a reply, and then she made a small face that was quickly swept away by a smile. The smile wasn't entirely genuine. "Not quite. I just haven't been active on any social media for a few hours and Seneca… That's my manager… Well… He is more than that… He is the executive director of my modeling agency but he takes care of some of us personally…"

He took care of the ones who made his company the most money, Haymitch deduced, he had heard Finnick talk about that once or twice although why the kid would want to get into that business still left him somehow puzzled.

"Anyway." She laughed off his lack of response and gave a gracious wave of her hand. "I need to feed the monster."

His gaze darted to the huge poster on the wall. She had said that golden version of herself was a fantasy and that _she_ was real but… Where did the fantasy end and where did she begin?

"You need me to go?" he asked, a little reluctantly. For all the awkwardness, he wasn't quite ready to take his leave yet, to risk never seeing her again…

" _No_." she answered a little too quickly. "It will just take a minute. Here… Let me…" She checked her reflection on her phone, touched her hair a couple of times, made sure her lipstick – a pale pink that day – wasn't smudged and then she lifted the phone. She took several pictures and then flashed him a smile. "Seneca would love me to hire someone to take care of my social medias in case I forget but I hate the thought of someone else being in control of them. Scandals are so easy to create nowadays…"

He propped his head on his hand and watched her tinker with contrast and filters until she had something she liked. "You've got to do that often, then? The picture thing?"

She finished typing something to go along with the picture, something he couldn't quite read from the other side of the counter but that looked suspiciously like _Quiet morning at home for me_ … which was completely stupid, and then she nervously shifted on the stool. "I am a public person, my life is almost constantly on display."

The implications of that statement were obvious and he looked down at his coffee because he wasn't sure he could brave her pleading eyes.

When word would get out that she had found her soulmate…

"You do not have to play that game, Haymitch." she offered quickly. "I would never ask you to. I will not post your picture and I will not talk about you on line, not without your permission."

That she didn't expect him to pose for pictures or expose himself to the herd of her fans made it slightly better. "Alright."

She hesitated. Her fingers twitched, her hand inched closer to his and then stilled. "This being said and in the interest of full disclosure I cannot promise you anonymity forever. We can be discreet, we can be careful… The press will still find out at some point. It _always_ does. It will be a circus for a few days and then hopefully it will calm down. But it does not have to be right now and we can weather that particular storm when we come to it."

"The less people know the better." he deduced.

She looked surprised and then perhaps a little hurt but it was soon covered up by her usual cheer. Did she think she was subtle? Did she think she fooled people? _Did_ she actually fool people? It was so obvious to him when she was hiding behind that mask… And it had been less than twenty-four hours.

"I was not suggesting hiding entirely but… Yes, that is sound reasoning." Her smile was too bright. Her hand slowly inched back and he covered it with his before she could take it away completely. The smile dimmed back to something less forced and she entwined their fingers. "We should definitely keep the _soulmates matter_ to ourselves for now… I already told Portia but I trust her completely."

"I'm gonna tell Chaff eventually." he warned her and then realized she had no clue who that was. It was weird how little they really knew about each other because when it was like that, when their hands were linked, he felt as if she had always been around. "My best friend. He's…"

"I remember him from last night." she interrupted with a nod.

"I trust him with my life." he promised and he didn't make that kind of promises lightly. "Might be Finnick's figured it out too. The little _shit's_ far too smart."

She frowned. "Would he sell us out? I can probably have that problem taken care of."

His eyebrows shot up. "What? You're gonna hire a hit man?"

He was joking. Mostly. Who knew how wealthy people like her handled their problems…

She rolled her eyes. "I can offer him better contracts than what he is currently getting. And money. Money is always an effective deterrent."

And she was being deadly serious too.

He shook his head. "Finnick won't say anything even if he knows. He ain't that kind."

"If you are sure, I trust your judgment." she offered, briefly squeezing his fingers.

He looked at their joined hands over the polished black granite and swallowed hard. "We're doing this, then?"

He wasn't sure why he was even asking. It had become obvious they would be doing this when he had chosen to stay the previous night. Hell, it had become obvious when she had touched his soulmate words and he hadn't flinched like he had every time someone had so much as brushed the scar on his side.

She was watching him, nervous herself. When she stood up and her hand slipped out of his, he looked up and followed her progress around the counter. She hesitated once she was standing next to him but he didn't. He wrapped his arms around her waist like it was second nature, like they had been doing this for years instead of hours, and when she perched herself on his lap, he simply made sure she wouldn't slide right off his lap because those stools of hers really weren't made for this. He held her close and felt the anxiety slowly unknot in his chest.

It was _easy_ to have her so close. She fitted so perfectly in his arms… He hated the cliché metaphor but it was like she had been made for him, like they had been made for each other… And he supposed they _had_.

But while the physical part was easy, it didn't mean the rest was.

"Are you scared?" she whispered, resting her head on his shoulder.

" _Shitless_." he offered point blank. He would have preferred facing a whole army rather than having to deal with all that emotional _crap_ he was going through. If she had just been a random girl in a bar… It might have been easier. He might have wanted to see her again but there would have been less pressure, less obligations to get it _right_. "You?"

She nuzzled his neck. She liked doing that, he had noticed… Rub her nose against the stubble under his jaw and then on the soft spot right behind his ear… He could get used to that really quickly.

It had been a long time since someone had been affectionate like that with him. It felt good. It scared him _how_ good.

Because if he grew used to it only to lose it…

"I find it less scary when you hold me." she confessed, leaning her head on his shoulder again. "I think that's the bond."

She blindly reached behind her for her phone. He took pity on her and grabbed it from the counter to hand it over. He wasn't happy the phone was being invited to their cuddling party – and he would not ever, _ever_ admit to anyone he was willingly _cuddling_ with a woman in the middle of the day without ulterior motives – but he let it go, watching her unlock it with her thumb's fingerprint. She wriggled to get more comfortable against him, forcing him to grab the counter to keep them steady because _those stools really weren't meant for that_ , but understood what she had in mind when she opened her internet browser and typed _soulmate bond_.

She opened the first result and he peered over her shoulder curiously.

"Soulmate bonds are unique and it is impossible to list symptoms of what to expect." he read out loud before scoffing. "Well, that's _fucking_ helpful."

She pursed her lips and scrolled further down.

"Here." she said. "Most soulmates describe their bond by talking about a strange instinct." She paused and hummed. "That seems right to me… Is it the same for you?"

"Yeah." he answered without hesitation. "Like… I can tell what you're feeling but not… Not like I'm in your head just…"

"Like a vague echo." she finished for him with a small smile and he nodded, tightening his grip on her. She kept on scrolling, almost too fast for him to see. "It seems for some people that instinct is extremely accurate and for some it remains dull. Some people can sense the other's presence, they can tell when they are in pain or in danger, lying becomes difficult… Some people are in perfect synch…"

"We can rule that one out." He snorted. "We're too different to be in synch."

She ignored him and kept reading. "While the bond is still settling it is common to feel anxiety… Well, this explains that…"

Anxiety was his default setting nowadays so he hadn't really noticed a change there but he didn't tell her that. He had been forced to tell her too much about himself already.

"They advise not to fight the bond, to let it settle and ease the transition if possible." she continued. "Whatever that means…"

He stared at the screen and then shrugged, propping his head against hers. "Maybe we just… stay together until we feel normal again." He made a face. "We' _re_ going to feel normal again, yeah?"

He stole the phone from her hand and scrolled lower but couldn't find any hint that the weird feeling would fade.

She cleared her throat. "I cleared my schedule as much as I could but my prep team will be here around four. I have to go to a red carpet tonight. Seneca will have my head if I don't."

Four pm was still quite a few hours away.

"It's _got_ to have settled by then." he told her, putting her phone down on the counter and wrapping his arm back around her. It felt like an empty wish but… "We can both go our own way, then."

" _Not_ forever." she countered, sounding a little panicky.

"No, not forever." he promised, to soothe the worry he could feel rising in her – _could_ he feel it or was it his imagination? How accurate was this bond going to make her feelings? "I've got more plans for you and that big bed of yours…"

She giggled, slowly relaxing. "Do you?"

"Oh, yeah…" he smirked, leaning down to kiss her. Her hand found his cheek, fell to his neck as she pressed closer to him…

She didn't let him deepen the kiss too much but she was smiling when she drew back. "What shall we do until four, then?"

He lifted his eyebrows, his smirk widening a little. "How about I show you some of my plans?" Truth be told, the whole thing hadn't seemed too bad or scary when they had been naked and tangled up together, even with the confessions that had spilled out of him. They should have stayed in bed, he figured, ignored the rest of the world and let that whole thing settle down. She bit down on her bottom lip, not quite meeting his eyes. He nudged her chin up with a frown. "What?"

She winced. "Honestly?"

"About sex? Always, sweetheart." he replied.

He wasn't sure he had liked most of what she had had to say about the subject so far. It was really nice she was game for a lot but he was a simple man when it came down to it and he was more concerned about how desperate to please she had sounded. He didn't want her to agree to something she wasn't really into just to make him happy and it seemed like she had been doing a lot of that over the years. She had said she didn't like being choked but that she was willing to negotiate and, added to the whole condoms thing, that raised red flags for him. There shouldn't have been any negotiation. If she didn't like it, she didn't like it, end of discussion.

"Unless you're gonna tell me I was _shit_ …" he added as a joke, to lighten up the quickly changing mood. "You definitely _should_ lie about that."

He was glad when she laughed and even gladder when she kissed him again.

"Can't you mind your language?" she chided against his lips.

He shrugged. "Never."

You couldn't take the army out of the guy and he hadn't been that tame with his mouth before he had become a soldier anyway.

She could take it or leave it.

"My mother would wash your mouth with soap." she commented. "She did it to me once and all I had said was _crap."_ He must have looked a little shocked because she gave a small half-shrug and one of those blinding smiles. "It sounds horrible but, to be fair, after that, I always remembered a lady minds her language in any situation. It is an effective method."

It also sounded pretty abusive to him but he held his tongue. He might not have a lot of experience about _seeing a woman_ but he wasn't stupid enough not to realize calling her mother names on their first day together might not end well.

"As effective as you changing the subject?" he taunted, pressing a soft kiss to her neck.

Her perfume was heavy and probably very expensive but it wasn't unpleasant. He wondered if it was _The Escort_ or one of its numerous new derivations.

It took a couple of minutes and more kisses to her neck that triggered these giggles he was quickly learning to love before she finally confessed. "I want you again but I am a little sore."

They had had a lot of sex.

And it hadn't exactly been sweet.

"Alright, then." he accepted, rubbing his thumb against her thigh.

He sought her mouth, happy to just kiss her for a while. Kiss her was enough to make him feel… _lighter_.

She deepened the kiss, turned it into a dirty thing that had him groaning in her mouth and tightening his grip on her because he could feel himself twitching with interest. " _Easy,_ princess."

"I can still take care of you." she countered in that sexy purr.

He almost let her do it, work him up, bring him pleasure… But he confusedly thought it would establish the wrong pattern. He didn't want her forcing herself to please him.

"I'm good." he lied, gently relocating the hand that had been drifting toward his belt to his shoulder. "What do you want to do then?"

He was thinking along the line of hanging out on the couch, maybe watch a movie, remaining huddled close together and wait for that stupid bond to stop playing havoc on their brains.

He should have known better.

"Perhaps we could go on a date?" she suggested, perking up. "I am starving and it is Lavinia's day off."

He frowned. "Who's Lavinia?"

"Oh… The help." she dismissed. "She does the cleaning, the grocery shopping and the cooking."

It threw him off. Of course, she wasn't doing her own cleaning or cooking… She was a famous star. Still… It threw him off balance. She must have noticed because she looked tentative all of a sudden, when she tightened her embrace he realized his had slackened.

"I don't really do dates." he replied, choosing to think about the help thing another time. They lived in two different worlds. He wasn't sure how they could coexist, never mind try to build something.

"I was not suggesting a candlelight dinner." she argued. "Simply some brunch. We could go back to that bakery… They had _darling_ pastries…" He must still have looked apprehensive because she rolled her eyes. "We will not call it a date. It is _absolutely not_ a date, just two people sharing a meal." She hopped off his lap as if the matter was decided but if she thought he didn't hear her muttered _'because a date is entirely more stressful than this whole soulmate thing'_ she was mistaken.

Still, he got his coat and followed her out the door once she had slipped on her coat and grabbed her purse. He could handle a brunch. He didn't remember the last time he had eaten one on one with a woman who wasn't part of his squad but he could handle it.

The elevator opened directly on her apartment. He hadn't had time to really notice the previous night because he had been otherwise – and more pleasurably – occupied but now it made him a little ill-at-ease. Could everyone come up as they wished?

It soon turned out the lobby was fiercely guarded by a doorman named Darius who was in charge of filtering visitors and making sure Effie wanted to see them before sending them up. The young man had a shocking heap of red hair and barely looked old enough to be out of high school so Haymitch wasn't sure how he would truly stop someone unwanted from forcing their way in but the young man was clearly eager to please.

One smile from Effie and he looked over the moon, stuttering and flushing a dark shade of pink.

"Everyone's as smitten with you, princess?" he mocked her, once they had switched elevators. That one led to an underground garage, it seemed. Haymitch would have been happy to walk but he had been told in no uncertain terms she wouldn't hike halfway across town on heels _ever_ _again_.

She shot him a grin. "Are you jealous?"

He snorted but didn't dignify that with a reply.

She looked a little disappointed.

When she stopped next to a red sport car that must have cost more than his house, he wasn't even surprised. It was a beautiful car and he ran his hand over the slick line of the roof appreciatively. It was absolutely ridiculous to spend so much on a car, obviously, but he could admit a tinge of envy. "Nice."

She flashed him a proud smile and he wondered if she actually liked cars or if it was all about the image a pretty girl in a sport car conveyed.

"I do not often get to drive." Effie offered once she had settled behind the wheel. "The agency usually sends cars with drivers… And, honestly, this car is made for speeding and open spaces and there are not a lot of opportunities to make the most of it in the city."

"You like speed?" He was surprised but he didn't really know why. She was very bad at keeping still, he had noticed, she kept fidgeting as if she had too much energy not to be in perpetual movement. Still, he couldn't help a touch of unease at the thought of racing cars on long winding roads. It took all he had to keep his mind in the now and then and to not let it flash back to a dark stormy night that had happened more than a decade earlier.

She tossed him a small guilty look. "Seneca refuses to drive with me outside of the city. He thinks I am a reckless driver. I think that is why he insists on me being chauffeured everywhere."

That was twice she had mentioned the man. He dropped the car subject for now and waited until she had turned the key in the ignition and the engine roared before addressing the subject. "Seems like you're close to that guy."

He had aimed for detached but she clearly wasn't fooled because she fought back a smile as she brought the car to the ramp exiting the garage. "I am but, rest easy, he prefers men."

He grumbled something unintelligible about how that wasn't what he was asking but he still relaxed a little in the leather seat and buckled his seatbelt – just in case that Seneca guy had the right of it and she was reckless.

It didn't take him three minutes in the street to decide she was the _most_ cautious driver he had ever met. She kept to the speed limit, respected every little rules and was generally very careful.

She must have sensed his confusion because she tossed him a brief distracted smile. "I like speeding on deserted roads. I do not like the thought of accidentally hurting someone in the street."

He accepted that explanation with a nod.

They were silent for a while but it wasn't as uncomfortable or awkward as before. Haymitch let his attention wander as he stared through the window. Traffic was slow as always in that part of the city and he watched people hurrying past, talking into their phones or bouncing their heads to whatever music echoed in their headphones…

"I had a thought." she said as she stopped the car at another red light.

"You _don't_ say." he mocked, looking back at her. She pursed her lips, tilted her head and narrowed her eyes at him in a disapproving way. The whole thing made him a little tight in his pants and he wondered what it was about her irritation that made her so attractive. "Fine." He chuckled. "Let's hear the big thought."

Her lips remained pursed but he sensed most of her annoyance was for show.

"Perhaps the bond would settle in quicker if we learned to know each other better." she suggested.

"So what?" he scorned. "You want to play twenty questions?"

His fingers twitched with the urge to slip his flask out of his inner pocket. He didn't like the thought of exposing his whole life, of…

"It does not have to be _heavy_ stuff, Haymitch." Her voice cut in his train of thoughts, strangely firm, as if she had perceived his sudden unease. Maybe she had. He didn't know what she was getting through the bond. "We can start with easy things like… When is your birthday?"

That wasn't too bad. "December. Thirtieth."

"Oh, that's soon!" she said it cheerfully as if it was something to celebrate. His birthdays usually passed unmarked unless Chaff remembered and dragged him to a bar.

"You?" he countered before she could ask if he already had plans.

"July. Twenty-eighth." she hummed.

He snorted. He couldn't help it. They were opposite in _everything_. When she tossed him a curious look, he shrugged. "Winter and summer… Do we have _one_ thing in common?"

Her lips twitched with amusement. "Atrocious soulmate words?"

He granted her the point with a smirk. "Fine. We're both very bad at first words."

" _Excuse_ _me_." she huffed. " _You_ are very bad at first words, I was simply defending myself."

Defending herself… His hand automatically drifted to his hipbone, a retort dying on his lips. How could he tell her that her words had tossed a shadow on every glass of alcohol he had ever drunk? That they had haunted him his whole life?

The mood was threatening to take a turn for the bad. She looked a little upset now. _His words couldn't have been easier to live with than his were_ , he reminded himself. Although it was less personal for her… He wished she had just called him _an ass_ instead of having to be witty. He could have lived with _you're the greatest asshole I have ever seen_ branded on his skin more easily than he had with _I would not get too close to that candle you are so full of alcohol you might catch fire._ Of course, it would have also made finding her more difficult. He _had_ been called an _ass_ more times than he could count.

"It's your turn." he said, not trusting himself not to say something stupid again. He didn't want to ruin this – and he _would,_ of course he would, he always ruined everything – not just yet.

Her fingers were drumming on the wheel and she took a left turn a little sharper than strictly necessary. "Favorite color?"

"White." he immediately answered without even thinking about it. He remembered entire fields covered with a shinny layer of immaculate snow from his childhood… White was… soothing.

"That is _not_ a color." she objected with a frown, bringing the car to a stop at another red light.

At that pace, they would reach the bakery in time for lunch.

"And what do you call it?" he mocked.

She remained mute for a second and then, unwilling to _not_ have the last word, she snorted. "A poor choice of a favorite color, that's what I call it. Was it one of your questions? Is it my turn?"

 _Sore loser_ , he deduced. She was too eager for a simple game without goals.

"It's _my_ turn, sweetheart. Don't cheat." He didn't care that much but he liked riling her up and she huffed just like he had known she would. "When did you lose your virginity?"

She wasn't expecting that. The car speeded a little before going back to its more subdued pace. Her eyes were twinkling with amusement when she turned them toward him. "Not my favorite color?"

"Your favorite color's pink. You've got pink everywhere over at your place. Doesn't take a genius to figure it out." he dismissed, letting his lips form another smirk. "So?"

She remained silent for a beat and then finally answered. "Seventeen."

"That's average." he teased.

She spotted a parking space and strained her neck to check the traffic behind them. "Disappointed?"

"A little." he taunted. "Was expecting a crazy story or something…"

"Well…" She sounded distracted, probably because trying to park on the street in the city was always hell. People honked and shouted at her to be quicker… People were so _nice_ in the city, he mused with a scorn… Effie was focused and didn't seem to even notice though. "He was older. Twenty-four. I made him wait for it so, truly, it was _no wonder_ he ended up cheating on me. He was my first great tragic heartbreak. Oh, actually, you might know of him… He is the photographer who did the first _Escort_ campaign… He might have broken my heart but he also made me a star so, you see, all in all… It was not that bad."

"Wait, wait, wait…" He frowned and twisted in his seat to face her. "Come again. He was _what_?"

She licked her lips and made such a show of checking her blind spot that he understood she was trying not to look at him straight in the eyes. "Twenty-four."

He scowled. "Sweetheart, I'm pretty sure that's a criminal offense."

"I am not so easily taken advantage of, I assure you." she deadpanned, a bit vexed. "I knew what I was getting into."

Somehow, he wasn't sure she had and it might explain why she was so… _flexible_ about her tastes in the bedroom.

It was probably best if he never met that photographer because he might be inclined to punch him in the face. Just to teach him not to approach any more teenage girls. "Why did you keep the poster?"

She turned off the engine and brought down the sun visor to check her reflection. "Because it is my best work and it is healthy to try and exceed yourself." With an annoyed pout, she tugged the hair tie free and ruffled her hair a little. With the cold, it had frizzled – which, he could tell, annoyed her – and it didn't look too straight anymore, the ends were starting to curl. She fished her purse from the backseat and pulled out her lipstick to apply another layer she didn't need. "My turn now. Did you go to college?"

Again, he fought the urge to reach for his flask. "No. Didn't even finish high school."

He waited, wondering if _now_ was finally the time she would realize just how different their backgrounds were.

"Me neither!" she beamed. At his incredulous look, she chuckled a little. "I started getting modeling contracts at fifteen but my career really began at seventeen when I was casted to be the face of _The_ _Escort_. There was really no point staying in school after that." She got out of the car and he followed, watching her slip on leather gloves. "See… We _do_ have things in common."

So maybe the lack of formal degrees wouldn't quite be the problem he had feared it would be…

He reached to tug on her scarf without really thinking about it, adjusting it to cover her throat. "You've got a hickey on your neck."

She accepted that remark without battling an eyelash but reached for the side of his neck. "Which makes three things in common so far…"

He pulled up the collar of his coat, taking a step closer to her. He wanted to kiss her but he wasn't sure what the rule about doing that in public was. _Hell_ , he had never been a particularly demonstrative man anyway but right then _with_ _her_ … He wanted to kiss her.

His eyes darted to her mouth and lingered there… She licked her lips but shot him a look of regret and he figured kissing in public might not be the wisest thing when you were worldwide famous and you were trying to hide your new – _not_ relationship because that word made him want to erupt in cold sweat – soulmate. .

"Shall we?" She reached for his hand and he automatically snatched it away, making her flush in embarrassment. "Sorry."

"No…" He winced and held out his hand tentatively, feeling like an idiot. They weren't sixteen to hold hands in the streets. And yet at the same time he knew he would feel better if they did. "Wasn't expecting it, that's all. It's alright."

She flashed him a doubtful smile. "It is fine if you do not like PDA, you know. You do not have to force yourself on my account."

"Never force myself. For _nobody_." he grumbled, wriggling his fingers. "Come on."

She hesitantly slipped her hand into his and he found himself regretting the fact she had put on gloves.

The leather was smooth against his palm but he would have preferred to feel her skin…

Was it the soulmate bond making him feel that way or was he addicted to her skin already?

* * *

 _Full disclosue this chapter was initially 25 pages long so I decided to cut it :) I hope you liked it! They're sarting to figure things out and get to know each other... Did you enjoy the 20 questions game? What about the kitchen cuddling? Can they do this, do you think? Or are they too different? Let me know your thoughts!_


	5. Chapter 5

Effie had parked a few streets away from the bakery and Haymitch counted every step, feeling terribly self-conscious to be seen holding hands with a girl like he was still a kid. He knew it was in his head mostly. People didn't pay them any attention. That was the good thing about the city, everyone was always too busy hurrying from one place to the next to care about other people's business in the street.

"So… I was working. What was your excuse for not finishing high school?" she asked.

For a moment, he lost himself in the sound of honking, shouts and conversations that was the city's background noise. He almost answered. Something _compelled_ him to answer. That _fucking_ bond, he suspected. But he had never told that sorry tale, even Chaff only had to content with a condensed version and while his best friend knew his story he didn't know the details… Haymitch confusedly felt if he started talking, he _would_ give her the details. Not because he truly wanted to but because that soulmate bound was nudging him to.

"Ain't the easy stuff, princess." he replied. He was relieved to see he _could_ resist the urge to spill his guts out to her. The instinct was pressing but not imperious and that was good news. Fate or not, he hated the thought of being anyone's puppet. He cleared his throat. "You've always lived here?"

He was also relieved when she didn't insist and accepted the change of subject without a blink. She looked up at him with a bright smile.

"New Yorker born and bred." she confirmed. "What about you?"

"I was born in Virginia." he shrugged. "A small town near Richmond. The Seam, it's called."

"It must be really different from the city…" she remarked. "Perhaps you could take me to visit sometimes."

Beyond the fact that she was already making casual holidays plans even though they had known each other less than a day, Haymitch found himself wincing. "Never been back."

"Oh…" She studied him for a moment and he waited for the obvious question about family but she didn't ask it, as if she knew it would be a bad idea – _did_ she know? Was it the bond whispering to her that she should switch topic again. "It is your turn, I believe."

Bond or not, he didn't hesitate to take the branch she was handing him.

"Last night, you said something… I'm curious but if it's heavy stuff…" He shrugged.

"Ask anyway." she encouraged, wrapping her free arm around his elbow. He felt even more ridiculous now. He had just gotten used to walking hand in hand and now she was snuggled close to his side… It also felt good though. Something inside him _loosened_.

"You said you date women too…" he hesitated.

She didn't tense or looked embarrassed or irritated like he had feared, she looked perfectly at ease with the question if a little nervous. "I refuse to hide it but I do not advertise it either, Seneca won't let me, so this is an information I would appreciate you kept to yourself. It is a sort of open secret."

He frowned. "Yeah, sure…"

"I try not to label myself." she explained next, her voice softening. "I like who I like regardless of genders, I have for a long time and I am comfortable with that. Will that be a problem?"

Would it? He had next to zero experience _dating_ someone, never mind someone who liked both men and women… But did it really matter anyway? She was his soulmate. And if they did this, and did it right, she would probably end up stuck with _him_ so…

"Not unless you're disappointed I'm not a woman…" He snorted and averted his eyes. "Though, I guess that's not the first thing about me you'd be disappointed about…"

She gave a sharp tug on his arm. "I am _not_ disappointed about _anything_. Stop that." He bristled at her chiding but her attention had shifted to the bakery they could now spot in the distance. "Oh, look! There are tables! How darling!"

Tables on the pavement were probably very nice in summer, not so much in winter – although given the proximity to the street, it must have been like eating in a cloud of fumes.

Still, he let her drag him toward the bakery a little quicker.

She ended up letting go of his arm and he felt the loss of her warmth at his side acutely. She looked excited like a child when she inspected the rows of little cakes and pastries on display and then peered through the window. He was relieved to see there were more of those small tables inside and very few patrons to go with it.

"It looks so cute…" She grinned and raised her eyebrows. "Don't you think it looks cute?"

"I'm having flashbacks about that shop window and I'm hoping they don't have surveillance cameras." he deadpanned, earning himself an amused look.

She ushered him inside and they joined the short line to the cash register. It was obvious the business must have been struggling and they had tried to court a new customer base, which explained the small tables and the fact they were selling hot beverages and sandwiches on top of the pastries and different kinds of bread.

"This could be _our_ place, you know." she teased. "This is where it started after all."

"Pretty sure it started against that window." he argued, for the sake of it.

She tried to give him a chiding look but her eyes were twinkling too much. Her hair really was starting to curl now and he couldn't resist the urge to brush it back behind her shoulder.

It was casual and yet once it was done, it felt huge to him. He wasn't the kind of guy who casually reached out to touch people. Not just people he might like but friends too. He simply wasn't touchy-feely. And yet ever since he had met her, he had spent his time finding excuses to touch her.

Maybe she had a point with the hand holding…

In any case, she looked pleased.

"What do you want to eat?" she asked, turning to the display window and inspecting her choices.

"That's your next official question?" he teased.

"My next official question is: are you always this caustic?" she retorted and then lifted a hand to interrupt him with a smile. "No, do not answer. I do not really need you to."

"You're too witty." he declared, burying his hands in his pockets and looking over at the products.

He almost missed the spark of uncertainty in her blue eyes. Almost.

"Yesterday it was a good thing." she pointed out.

His instinctive answer was _'that was yesterday'_ because he liked the banter and he wanted to keep it going but he sensed, deep down, that it would only take one remark too many about it for her to watch every word that would come out of her mouth, to restrain herself and try to become exactly what he wanted.

And that was scary on more than one account.

It was like her desperation to cater to his every sex fantasy. Unhealthy and potentially damaging.

"I like it." he forced himself to acknowledge.

She immediately perked up, her eyes brightening and her lips stretching into a blinding smile that made him want to kiss her, audience be damned.

"Good morning, Miss! What can I get you?" the preppy young girl behind the counter asked. She had dark red hair and her badge claimed her name was Delly.

Haymitch glanced around while she placed her order – not even trying _not_ to roll his eyes when she started discussing calories like she actually needed to watch her figure – and noticed the man lurking at the other end of the counter, in the designated waiting area. That guy seemed to be _listening_ to what Effie was ordering and it wasn't even really subtle…

"Oh, and one tall Mocha, please." she finished.

Haymitch opened his mouth to mock her about her coffee consumption when the guy suddenly jumped on them.

Haymitch reacted on pure instinct. He felt threatened – he felt _Effie_ was threatened – and so he grabbed her and pushed her behind him, barely hearing her shriek, and stood so tall and menacing the guy seemed to shrink on himself. He eyed Haymitch wearily but his brown eyes still darted to Effie.

"It's you!" the guy exclaimed.

Effie, in her surprise, had grabbed Haymitch's arm and while he wished she would let go because if it became physical her grip would slow him down, it also allowed him to see her wince. She clearly hadn't planned on being recognized and he suddenly wondered if she had untied her hair and ruffled it on purpose since she had posted that picture of herself with straight hair and a ponytail less than an hour earlier.

"I am sorry, I think there might be some mistake…" she started, clearly intending to deny her identity.

"You're my soulmate!" the guy loudly insisted, taking a step forward and then thinking better of it faced to Haymitch's glower and taking two hasty steps back. Everyone was looking at them by then. " _One tall Mocha, please!_ They're my soulmate words!"

There was a long beat of silence and then the few customers in the bakery exchanged muffled laughter and mocking comments.

Was that why he had been lurking next to the counter? Waiting to hear people's orders? The _obsession_ of some people for soulmates would always leave him breathless.

"I am sorry." Effie said again. "I am not your soulmate."

"But you _must_ be!" the guy insisted, clearly star-struck. "The words…"

"You wanna hear those words again, go to _Starbucks_." Haymitch cut him off in a growl. "She's already bonded so stop bothering her."

"Bonded?" the guy repeated, stunned.

"Yeah. To _me_." he spat. "You want to keep claiming my soulmate's yours or we can all move on and get our lunch?"

The man must have seen on his face that Haymitch really wasn't kidding because he blabbered an apology, tossed Effie a look of deep regret – and maybe longing – grabbed the coffee to go Delly handed him and left. There were franker bouts of laughter here and there and then everyone went back to their own business.

Nobody gave him and Effie a second glance and that was lucky because he had been pretty sure the attention would have made at least _one_ of them recognize her.

"I am sorry about that…" Delly cringed. "He comes here and does that twice a week."

"Should call the cops on him." Haymitch grumbled, wrapping his arm around Effie's shoulders when she leaned against him without even noticing.

"We can't really afford to lose customers." the young girl winced and then forced a big customer friendly smile on her lips. "What can I get you, sir?"

He ordered a sandwich and some herbal tea that made Effie lift an inquiry eyebrow. He ignored her. Just like he ignored her smug look once he realized they were publicly snuggling together.

He also batted away her hand when she reached for her purse, grumbling under his breath that he could buy his soulmate lunch, thank you very much, all the way to their table. Probably sensing that he wouldn't take any teasing about dates and gentlemanly behavior very well – his ears burned so he figured they were red and not just because of the date but because he had just claimed her in front of a room full of people – she offered a simple thank you and attacked her savory tart.

"I like you calling me your soulmate." she observed, after a minute or two.

She was a delicate eater.

Most people ate with their fingers – and he hadn't bothered grabbing more than a couple of napkins for his sandwich – but she used plastic covers like she was in a four stars restaurant. She made eating a graceful show.

"Don't like other people calling you _their_ soulmates." he muttered, a bit grumpy.

She hid her smile behind a forkful of tart. "So… You are a tea drinker?"

Back to the game, then.

"Yeah." he admitted. "Ain't much for coffee."

She frowned a little. "You should have said something this morning… I am sure there is tea in the penthouse… Somewhere… I could have texted Lavinia…"

"Thought it was her day off?" he countered.

"Well, it is… But she might have answered a text." she retorted and, as if the mention of texting had made her remember about her phone, she slipped it out of her pocket and checked she hadn't had any new messages. She discarded a few texts and then placed it on the table, screen first so it was upturned. Either not to get distracted or because she didn't want him to see.

"It's your kitchen, you know…" he taunted. "You should know where stuff is…"

"I know where things are!" she huffed. "I _do_ cook for myself sometimes. I will have you know I can make delicious soups and smoothies…"

"So, you know how to use a blender." he mocked.

She huffed again and shot him a dark look. "Do _you_ cook?"

"Ain't a chef but I can feed myself without having to hire a cook." He shrugged and took a bite of his sandwich, not resisting the urge to get one last gibe. " _And_ I know where my tea is."

She pursed her lips, her eyes narrowing. "Please, chew and swallow before you talk, you will upset my appetite."

He didn't take that rebuttal about manners very well and made a show of chewing loud and with an open mouth.

She wrinkled her nose in a disgusted expression that made him smirk around his sandwich.

Finally, he took pity on her and stopped putting on a show. He took a sip of his herbal tea, found it a little too fade for his taste and automatically reached for the flask in his inner pocket, only stopping himself when it was out and in plain sight.

Her eyes had tracked the movement and she was now staring at it.

He was frozen, not quite sure he hadn't just ruined everything by reminding her alcohol was his weakness.

"You can drink if you need to." she said softly, averting her eyes to her coffee.

 _Did_ he need to?

He felt the craving for it but he didn't think he was addicted to the stuff yet. Sure, he had terrible headaches when he went a few days without touching any liquor and he would willingly call himself a drunk but… Truth be told, the months he had spent recovering had forbidden him access to anything alcoholic, it was only after, once he had been released from the hospital and he had been left to his own devices, off the meds and painkillers, that he had started drinking to drown his demons. He was halfway down the slope that led to addiction, he saw that plainly and his soulmate words were a good reminder in case he decided to deny it, but he didn't think he was _there_ yet.

His hands didn't shake if he stopped drinking for two or three days – and he _did_ stop drinking for a few days now and then, just to check if he had finally crossed the line yet or not.

Slowly, he placed the flask back in his inner pocket without pouring any in his plastic cup. He was sitting with a beautiful woman with whom he had just had a lot of awesome sex. There were no demons to fight right then.

"I don't." he answered firmly.

She flashed him an encouraging smile and briefly covered his hand with his before going back to cutting her tart with her ridiculous plastic knife.

It was his turn to ask a question but he couldn't think of anything right then so it was no wonder she eventually looked at him, uncertainty on her face. "May I ask something that is probably not _easy stuff?"_

He shrugged, ill-at-ease. "Try."

She took her time wording that question, calculating how best to formulate it. She took two sips of her coffee and almost finished her tart before she finally uttered it. "I have seen my share of alcoholic people and junkies. Modeling and show business are not exactly a clean environment. Either you have been very sneaky about it or you haven't drunk anything since last night… You said you were an alcoholic but addicted people usually do not last that long between two doses unless they are at the very beginning…"

"Said I was _a drunk_." he corrected, hard and cold. "And I _am_. I go on binges. Sometimes being drunk is the only way I can function." He shook his head. "You said it yourself, sweetheart… If I go anywhere near a candle…"

"You were drunk and extremely disagreeable when I said that." she cut him off. "That does not make you an alcoholic." He opened his mouth to argue and she lifted her hand to stop him. "You are not yet addicted, you could simply stop drinking."

 _You could simply stop drinking…_

"There's nothing _simple_ about that." he scoffed.

Even the thought of never tasting alcohol again made him want to reach for the flask and down it. His body might not be there yet but his mind was. Reaching for a bottle was his first reflex when he was upset. And he had been upset a lot all his life.

The only reason he wasn't yet a liquor sponge was because he would never have endangered his squad by drinking when they were deployed and their missions had lasted months.

"I know." she answered. He sneered at her because he hated it when people pretended to understand something that was _beyond_ them. She gave him a small sad smile. "I had some problems with sleeping pills a couple of years back. The prescription was too heavy. I could not function without them anymore, getting off them was not pleasant but I do not regret it."

The sharp retort he had been about to utter died on his lips. He looked at her up and down and then slowly finished his sandwich. "So we do have things in common, then."

"I would help." she insisted. "If you wanted to try and… stop drinking before you get to a place you _cannot_ stop."

He considered that while he took two sips of his bland tea. "How?"

That was a practical question she clearly hadn't seen coming but she didn't let that disturb her.

"You are my soulmate." she argued. "Surely, the bond would help."

Would it? He wasn't sure.

It was something he needed to think about more in depth and not in a rundown bakery while she stared at him. He bit into the muffin she had ordered for dessert, ignoring her outraged _hey_!

"Blueberry's my favorite." he offered, pushing the chocolate muffin she had been eying and had refused herself toward her. It was the only reason he had bought it. Because she had clearly wanted it.

She stared at the chocolate muffin and then slowly started cutting it in small pieces. She moaned around the first one and it shot straight to his groin.

"That's it." he snorted. "I'm gonna buy you chocolate muffins every day."

She giggled and tilted her head to the side, her eyes sparkling. "I will grow fat."

"You could gain a few pounds." he commented. She didn't _quite_ flinch but she received the remark like a slap, he could tell. She slouched for half a second and then sat rod straight, her chin up and her bearing regal. He frowned. "Wasn't saying that in a bad way… You're gorgeous. You know you're gorgeous."

" _Of course_ , I know I am gorgeous." she scoffed. "Although clearly too skinny for you. It shows your lack of taste, that is all." She took a hasty sip of coffee. "I believe it is your turn to ask me a question."

He almost dug the skinny subject but decided they had explored enough heavy stuff for now.

"Effie's your real name or is it a nickname?" he asked.

She groaned. "Nickname. You do _not_ want to know my full name, I promise you."

"Well, now, I'm curious, princess…" he chuckled.

She stalled for time by stealing the last piece of his – technically hers – blueberry muffin. When she finally answered it was in a dejected voice. "Euphemia."

It took him a moment to realize it was her real name and not random syllables stuck together. He lifted his eyebrows in surprise. "Your mom hates you or something?"

"Very possibly yes." she said in a flippant tone. "But I do not think she chose that name because she did."

He wanted to ask more about her mother because he sensed – or rather _the bond_ made him sense – there was a lot to uncover there but she finished her coffee in one long swallow and looked up at him. "Do not look but the two girls at the table near the window are starting to give me looks. We should go before they gather the courage to come over here and ask me if I am _the Escort_. We could walk around for a little while…"

He shrugged his agreement. He didn't mind a stroll after what had been a surprisingly good lunch.

She didn't take his hand again once they were outside but they walked close together, so close that their shoulders bumped against each other every few steps.

They kept asking questions but they were mostly bland and unobtrusive, like their favorite movie or book, as if they had both privately decided they had explored enough heavy stuff for a first date slash morning after. They still found reasons to argue – mostly about her choices in movies – and Haymitch relished the banter. When she got so irritated her eyes shone with it, it made him want to push her against the closes flat surface and kiss her.

They walked for a very long time, exploring small shops he had no idea existed in the city and arguing about almost everything. Around two thirty she started checking her phone every ten minutes though. When she caught him looking, she winced and apologized before explaining she hated being late.

So they slowly started going back to her car...

And the anxiety skyrocketed into something almost _crushing_.

When she grabbed his hand on their way there, he didn't complain. He simply clung to it like a drown man to a lifesaving line.

When they finally reached the car, he almost thought he was going to be sick. Cold sweat was running down his spine and he wasn't sure he would be able to let go of her hand long enough for her to get in the car.

"You could come to the red carpet with me." she blurted out, sounding as tense as he felt. "If you do not have a tuxedo, I could have one delivered to the penthouse for you by tonight. Prepping time might not be fun to watch but…"

"We can't let that bond boss us around, Effie." he cut her off and she fell silent. Because she knew he was right most likely.

He wanted to say yes even though the perspective of watching her get dolled up and then of spending the whole night being gawked at by strangers was hellish. He wanted to say yes just to stay with her. But… Where would it stop?

They needed to get it under control.

She leaned against the side of the car, still holding his hand, and he stepped in close, closer than was probably wise in public. She was pouting. "I feel like I will never see you again…"

"Yeah, that ain't happening." he scoffed. "It's just the bond playing tricks on our minds, sweetheart."

"That or we have abandonment issues." she snapped. Maybe they _did_ have things in common after all. "When can I see you again?"

"You tell me…" He shrugged, trying to play it casual even though he was probably even more desperate than she was. "Ain't exactly the one with busy days here."

She bit down on her bottom lip, watching him while she thought. _Schemed_ more like.

"How about tonight?" she suggested. "The event will probably end up late but… I will tell Darius to let you up… You can come whenever you want and wait for me… You can spend the night again. I promise to make it worth your while _and_ I will be careful with your night terrors so you do not need to be concerned about me…"

"Don't need to sell it so hard." he snorted, tugging on her scarf with the hand that wasn't clutching hers. "Yeah. I can come by tonight."

She nodded. "That's only a few hours away."

Her eyes were a little shiny and she kept blinking as if she was trying not to cry.

 _He_ didn't want to cry. He wanted to wrap around her and never let go again.

"Yeah." he told her, forcing himself to sound normal and not desperate. "Just a few hours. You should get in the car now."

"Do you need a ride to your place?" she asked, almost hopeful.

Somehow, he knew that if he accepted the ride, they would never manage to part. "I'm good. I'll take a taxi."

She looked disappointed but nodded. "You _promise_ you will come?"

"Give me your phone." he requested. She unlocked and handed him the phone. He typed his number in as quickly as he could. "There. Now you can call or text if you're feeling…"

"Stupidly lonely without you?" she finished with a mocking scoff for her own behavior. "I lived my whole life without you. How is it I feel so terrified of leaving you now?"

He kissed her, possible audience or paparazzi be _damned_.

"It's gonna be okay." he swore against her lip even though it didn't feel like it would be. "Just a few hours. We need to show that fate _bitch_ who's the boss… We can go a few hours without each other…" He wasn't sure which one of them he was trying to convince here. "We're gonna make it just fine."

She kissed him hard as if she was about to jump off a cliff. "I am going to get in my car and drive away without looking back now. Or I will never go at all."

"Drama queen." he accused with fondness.

She stole a last kiss and got in her sport car without answering. He didn't stay to watch her get the car out of the parking spot. He walked away, his breathing labored. It was like pulling on a rubber band. He could feel the bond stretching, _straining,_ and for a moment he was scared it would either snap or make him turn around and run back to her.

After a few minutes the upsetting sensation lessened and he could breathe again.

He reached for his phone before it even _pinged._ Was that a part of the bond too?

There was a text from an unknown number: _'I miss you'_.

He could picture her so clearly… Sitting in her car at a red light, the phone balanced on her lap…

' _Don't text & drive'_ he awkwardly typed back. He fought with himself for the better part of two minutes before caving and pulling the phone out of his pocket again. _'Miss U 2'._

It was a long walk back to his house and he was exhausted by the time he reached it. He promised himself he would never let Finnick drive him anywhere so he wouldn't remain stranded like that another time.

As soon as he let himself inside, the silence and the loneliness wrapped themselves around him once more, like a familiar cocoon. They made it very hard to breathe and suddenly he missed Effie with the same intensity he had when she had pulled away in her car. It was stupid. He would see her in a couple of hours and everything would be fine. He _wasn't_ going to get dependent on that soulmate thing. He had lived for thirty years without it and he could go on living without it. This was all ridiculous.

He shuffled his feet to the kitchen and contemplated the bags full of trash littering the floor and the row upon row of bottles lining the counter. Some were full, some were empty. He knew none of the other rooms was in a better state than this one.

His house was a pigsty.

A part of him revolted against the idea of cleaning just because Effie might eventually want to see where he lived. He had never made an effort for anyone else before and she couldn't take him just as he was… But _was_ he like that though? Or was it a combination of laziness, depression and exhaustion?

Before he could let himself linger too much on the reasons why, he started hauling the trash outside and even went as far as pulling the hover out of the cupboard it had been hidden in. The end result wasn't that great even if he gave it his best.

Maybe he _should_ listen to Chaff when he insisted Haymitch needed a housekeeper.

Reaching for the bottle of liquor was a reflex but instead of taking a mouthful, he spent a long time staring at the translucent liquid inside the glass. Did he need it? There was a headache buzzing behind his eyes and he was salivating at the mere thought of taking a sip.

 _You are not yet addicted, you could simply stop drinking._

Stop drinking.

Stop pretending not to understand Chaff's indirect comments about how drinking alone in the dark wasn't really _good_.

Stop pretending not to notice the looks his friends exchanged behind his back when he finished a whole bottle by himself.

Stop running away from his demons and face them head on…

He wasn't sure he could do that.

Even if he had a sunny soulmate to hold his hand through it…

* * *

 _Soooo we touched personal topics today... Can they make it work? Can Haymitch give up booze before it's too late? Is Effie going to make it to that red carpet? What are your thoughts? Still interested?_


	6. Chapter 6

Effie climbed in the limo waiting for her, careful not to damage the red dress that flooded down her legs in uneven slashed strips of fabric. It was a beautiful dress. A loan from a very famous stylist, just like the diamonds on her ears and the large rigid gold necklace around her neck – she always wore a touch of gold, always, it was her trademark – were a loan from some expensive jewelry. She looked divine. She knew she looked divine. And yet she was still fussy about Octavia's comment.

"You're late." Seneca remarked when she finally managed to sit on the leather seat of the limo without creasing the fabric or stepping on one of the strips. He didn't even look up from his phone, she knew from experience he was shooting emails.

"A lady is never late, everyone else is simply early." she retorted, more sharply than she would usually have. Usually, she might even have apologized because she _was_ late and it was mostly her fault. Her prep team had had a lot more troubles than usual getting her ready.

Octavia had said she looked tired and had been forced to use her magic make-up to make sure she looked radiant and fresh – she had also clucked her tongue in disappointment when Effie had refused to explain the hickeys on different parts of her body. Flavius had declared her hair was even more of a mess than usual and had spent close to an hour trying to brush away the tangled curls. Venia had laid out everything she would be wearing that night and had been annoyed when she had claimed she didn't like the jewelry – and she still didn't. She had snapped at them when they had started gossiping about the latest rumors – prime amongst which was Portia's latest picture on _instagram_ that was vague but hinted at the presence of a new man in her life.

The three of them hadn't said anything, of course, but she knew they had all been irritated by her checking her phone every two minutes – there had been no messages and she had agonized over the possibility of sending one herself; would it make her look desperate if she sent Haymitch another text so soon when they had planned to meet later? She was generally far more focused during prepping time, making their work that much easier. That night she had behaved like a diva, she knew it, and she would either have to apologize or give them a raise.

Her remark did the impossible and made Seneca glance up from his phone. "Someone is grumpy." He studied her with an expert eye and offered a small smile. "You look lovely."

 _Gorgeous._ Haymitch had said _gorgeous_.

Almost without being aware of it, she reached inside the clutch she had placed next to her on the seat and grabbed her phone. She held it tight and resisted the urge of tapping her foot. A lady didn't tap her foot or showed any sign of impatience.

The bond was making her _crazy._

"Thank you." she managed to mutter, looking through the window.

Traffic was slow, like always, and her few minutes of lateness would ensure they would arrive amongst the last ones to the event.

"I saw the pictures you posted from the prepping." Seneca told her, opening his instagram as if to have another look. "They are good but you do not seem to be having fun. You _need_ to sell it harder, Effie. And you cannot disappear from your social medias for a whole day again."

"Perhaps I was _not_ having fun." she snapped. "I did not want to go to the red carpet."

He flashed her a look of surprise, as much because of her tone as what she was saying, she wagered.

He studied her again, let his eyes linger on her face and then slowly rubbed his chin in a nervous tell. His beard was perfectly groomed – he had a barber on speed dial coming every morning and before every big event.

Haymitch's beard wasn't perfectly groomed.

But oh, did it feel good when he…

She _didn't_ bit her bottom lip because she would _not_ ruin her make-up but the yearning in her chest was so painful she almost couldn't breathe. She wanted to jump out of the car and run until she collapsed in his arms and that horrible tearing sensation stopped – she didn't know where he lived but she knew the strange new instinct would take her straight there if she let it. It had been terrible when she had driven away from him but the bond had seemed to settle down after a few minutes and she had thought it would be alright for a few hours. She had stopped crying, she had jutted her chin up and she had forced herself to smile because her soulmate might have been a little screwed up but so was she and perhaps they might _do_ something with that after all.

A few minutes into prepping time, the anxiety had come back with a vengeance.

She was nervous, fidgety… She wasn't even sure half of the overwhelming amount of feelings was hers. It was too new, too difficult to decipher, too intricate to analyze but she was pretty sure that her disquiet had been feed by Haymitch's own unrest, that he had been even more fretful than her and that it had only amplified her feelings.

"What did you hear?" Seneca asked, far too seriously.

Distracted, she frowned at him. "What do you mean?" They watched each other in silence for a long time and Effie grew even more nervous for very different reasons. She knew Seneca very well, she had known him for a very long time and considered him one of her closest friends. She knew when he was hiding something. "Seneca, _what do you mean_?"

He held her gaze for a second longer and then averted his eyes toward the window. "The people from _GameMaker Inc_ will be here tonight. It would be best if you were your most charming self."

Her frown deepened.

 _GameMaker Inc_ was the major shareholder of _the Escort_ brand and she had always been on very cordial terms with them. She had met a few of its key people over the years but her contacts with them had always been somehow limited to social events like that red carpet. It was Seneca's job to negotiate on her behalf and handle anything businesslike.

That remark, as trivial as it made it sound, was triggering alarm bells. There had been persistent rumors a few weeks earlier that _GameMaker Inc_ was holding secret castings to find a new Escort. But it had only been a rumor. Seneca had _swore_ it was only a rumor. _GameMaker Inc_ had denied. _She_ had denied leaving their advertisement campaign.

"You said the next contract was in the bag." she hissed. "You said…"

"I know what I said." Seneca cut her off. "I may have… _embellished_ the truth a little."

" _Embellished_?" she exclaimed, truly shocked. Her heart rate increased dangerously as panic momentarily made her freeze. _The_ _Escort_ was what she had built her career on. "Seneca, this is my main contract." It was her main source of income and, while she was pretty sure she would never lack for anything thanks to judicious investments her father had handled for her, it would still have consequences. Without that contract, she wouldn't be able to keep the penthouse. She could find something else, something big and nice but the penthouse would have to go. And that was without considering… "If I lose it, I will lose more contracts."

She was _the Escort_ , that was her selling point. Stylists and other brands hired her because of it, because of her association to luxury, because her face was plastered all over the world as a symbol of wealth, refinement and seduction and their products, through her, were associated to that too.

If she wasn't _the_ _Escort_ …

"If it comes to that, we will control the narrative." Seneca promised, looking a little uneasy. "We will negotiate so we can say it was our choice to leave."

"Everyone will know anyway." she argued. Fashion was a little world. There was no keeping secrets that big. She reached for her face, stopped herself at the last moment when she remembered the make-up. "How did this happen?"

Her voice had gotten shrill and she barely heard Seneca's answer through the anarchic beating of her heart. Something about economic crisis and _GameMaker Inc_ hoping that a revamp of their image would boost sales…

She looked down at her phone a second before it started to buzz with a series of messages too close together for her to try and answer them.

' _What's wrong?'_

' _U're upset.'_

' _\+ than before'_

' _Or I'm going crazy'_

Could Haymitch feel her panic through the bond? Could he feel the world disappearing from under her feet leaving her freefalling in a very frightening unknown?

She was twenty-five. In terms of modeling she knew she only had a few years left to enjoy before she would need a career change. She already worked less than she had two years earlier. She knew the realities of the job weren't pretty, that it was all about image and that hers was becoming old.

She knew.

But…

It now made perfect sense why Seneca was following Finnick's beginner's career with so much attention. Finnick was promising. Finnick would be his next Effie Trinket. Finnick was her replacement.

' _I am fine'_ she typed and then deleted it without sending, knowing Haymitch was probably staring at three moving dots with dread on his own phone screen. Would it change anything for him if she became a nobody? Would she still be enough to…

' _Sweetheart, I'm starting to worry 4 real'_ came the next message.

She took a deep breath. If she listened to that very strange new instinct, she thought she could feel it. Haymitch's worry. For _her_. It gave her the strength she needed to stop panicking and start scheming. Seneca was still talking. Numbers and exponential growth and technical terms she had never really made an effort to understand.

' _I am alright.'_ she finally typed. _'Just got some news I was not expecting'_.

"What do you need me to do?" she asked out loud, cutting Seneca's rants about the current economic situation and how difficult it made his job. He had been forced to sell a yacht but she wasn't feeling very sorry for him given than he had two more he barely used. "It is not over yet, is it?"

The good thing about Seneca was that he could be holding a silly one-sided conversation one minute and be entirely focused on important subjects the next. When he looked back at her, it was with one of his intense stares. "We need publicity. Preferably good. Forgive me for saying so but you are becoming old news. We need to keep you interesting."

 _How about the story of how she had met her soulmate at a speed soulmate finding event?_

The thought came, intrusive and petty, extremely tempting.

She almost said it out loud, almost told Seneca about Haymitch, because she knew that was the kind of stories they could sell, the kind of story that would make the headlines and place her in the spotlight for a few weeks at least. They could make it good, she could cash on that.

Haymitch was handsome – which wouldn't hurt – and he was also a soldier who had been wounded serving his country – which made him a hero and would ensure his popularity. With the right coaching, she could make him famous. With the right coaching, she could make _them_ a power couple that would rock New York to its foundations.

It would be _that_ easy.

Just tell Seneca.

Just tell the world.

Her phone buzzed.

' _This shit is WEIRD!'_ the message read _'I can FEEL u freaking out'_ A moment and then another one came. _'I THINK I can. U'r sure U'r ok?'_

She could still feel a vague echo of concern down the end of that new instinct. Concern for her.

Haymitch wouldn't care for publicity. He couldn't care for the spotlight. And, she suspected, he wouldn't care to be paraded around like a national hero either.

And did she want to sacrifice _this_ on the altar of her fame anyway? She had so few _real_ relationships in her life as it was… She had Portia who she trusted completely, the only friend she could rely on entirely. She had Seneca who she trusted a bit less because between his interests and hers, he would always choose his, but who, she knew, sincerely loved her as much as she loved him. She had her sister whose life was so different than hers it wasn't even funny. Other people… Other people either worked for her or always ended up somehow using her for her connections and money. And then there was her mother but that was another can of worms entirely and one she preferred not to open.

But Haymitch…

Haymitch was her _soulmate_. It might possibly be the truest relationship she was likely to ever get – atrocious soulmate words be _damned_ – and she knew deep down that she didn't want to jeopardize that. Not when he was so different from everyone else in her life. Not when he seemed so fragile behind those walls of his. Not when he was hurting and needing her.

So she let the words die on her lips and turned them into a soft smile.

' _I am now =)'_ she sent and didn't regret it. Her mother would have called her foolish. She called herself a pragmatic. It was never wise to put all your eggs in the same basket. If her career collapsed she would at least still have a love life.

Seneca looked a little annoyed she was paying more attention to her phone than to him but didn't comment out loud. The car slowed to a stop and a glance through the window was enough to tell her they had arrived. She placed her phone in her clutch and flashed him a feral smile.

"Let's get our contract back, darling." she declared. " _The_ _Escort_ is mine."

Seneca let out some chuckles but gave her a small bow. "I prefer you like that."

The moment she stepped out of the car, she was at the top of her game. She gave the press and the crowd of fans the show they wanted. Seneca gallantly held her clutch for her while she posed for pictures and answered the traditional questions journalists asked at such events – mostly, _who_ was she wearing. She was just the right side of sassy. Enough to be attractive, not enough to come off as intimidating. It was a fine line she had long ago learned to tap-dance on.

For a minute or two, she even managed to enjoy herself.

The red carpet was for the opening – reopening? it was hard to keep track in this city – of a prestigious shop and people were invited to select items and buy. Seneca waved away the enthusiastic shop girl who rushed to them and offered to show them around but Effie accepted the flute of champagne before she ran away.

Shopping and drinking… It should have been more pleasurable than that.

Her eyes scanned the impossibly large room until she found Plutarch Heavensbee in great conversation with two men equally plump and with the same receding hairlines. She took a sip of champagne and nastily thought they should buy themselves hair implants with all the money they would save by hiring someone else than her to be _The Escort_.

"Divide and conquer?" Seneca suggested with a winning smile and a twinkling spark in his eyes.

"Divide and conquer." she confirmed.

She slipped away in the opposite direction the three people from _GameMaker Inc_ were standing in. She walked like a queen to a group of her friends, triggered admirative exclamations about her dress, her hair, her make-up… She gobbled up the flattery and answered in kind with compliments that were forced and fake but necessary in her line of work.

She mingled for the better part of an hour, picking up items at random and handing them to the energetic shop girl who shadowed her to ring them for her.

Under the cover of laughing with someone or partaking in the unavoidable gossip, she studied her prey.

Plutarch Heavensbee was regularly checking his pocket watch, growing exponentially more bored. He was her main target. Plutarch was the main shareholder of _GameMaker Inc_ and, lately, had started to dabble in politics even though he publicly denied any grand ambition of doing anything more than dabble at local level. He was also a very close friend of her mother, a fact she had always tried _not_ to exploit too often because she never heard the end of it when she did. For some reason Plutarch, who protected his own interests perhaps more fiercely than even Seneca, was terribly faithful to her mother's friendship – she might have grown so far as to say he actually _loved_ her even though she had never stopped to reflect on the nature of that love because it was _far_ too disturbing – and, in consequence, was genuinely fond of her and of Lyssandra.

If she wanted answers, that was where she needed to find them.

She waited until Plutarch finally put his watch away with an expression of relief and then she swept in before he could take a step toward the exit with a killer smile and two flutes of champagne. A man who had been trapped at a shopping event for hours was more likely to do anything to get back to his bed. Even spill everything about his latest advertisement campaign _or_ promise a model she still had the gig.

"You look awfully bored, Plutarch." She grinned and handed him a flute. "Perhaps I can make your evening less dreadful?"

Plutarch greeted her with a sincere smile and accepted the glass she handed him with a grateful nod. "You look dashing as always, my dear. One of Portia Rose's dresses, is it?"

She would have preferred it. That dress didn't suit her taste.

"Not this one, no, but I am walking for her next week." she explained. "Her new spring collection."

"I hope she's keeping some surprises for the fashion week." Plutarch answered politely. "You will be her star model, I suppose?"

"We have not discussed it yet." She lowered her eyes in a falsely modest attitude that most men in power found charming. Plutarch, she could tell, wasn't particularly fooled but, then again, she had learned all her tricks from her mother and Plutarch knew Elindra too well. "I might even be too busy to do the fashion week this year. I have several advertising propositions and you know how those shoots take time."

"Truly?" Plutarch asked, lifting his eyebrows. "Good for you."

She let out a small laugh. "No other perfume though! Do not worry! I know there is an exclusivity clause on our contract and I am _ever_ so proud of being your _Escort_ …"

"Ah, yes…" The businessman aimed a smile at her that betrayed _nothing_. He might have added something if the crowd hadn't suddenly erupted in gasps of admirations. People _ooh_ and _aaah_ and Effie had to strain her neck to see what had caught their attention.

She didn't have to wait long to discover it though.

Cashmere Richmond had just made a – so late it might only qualify as rude – entrance. She was dazzling in a short leather ensemble, her dark blond hair braided away from her face but let loose down her back… Her smile was bright but her blue eyes were cold and assessing. She looked, in short, like an Amazon warrior.

Effie had never really paid her any attention. There were thousands of blond, blue-eyed girls trying to reach the heights of the fashion world in New York. She had been aware the girl was on the rise lately but…

"If you will excuse me, I was waiting for Miss Richmond." Plutarch immediately said and then made his way over to the girl who was already in deep conversation with the two other men from _GameMaker Inc_. She tossed her head back and laughed at something one of them said…

Gloss Richmond, her brother and her manager, slid next to her discreetly and placed a hand at the small of her back before expectedly snatching the conversation away from her.

Effie watched it all from afar and she felt sick.

No business would be discussed in there, of course, but it wasn't the point.

She found Seneca lurking next to a display stand full of overpriced watches. He was studying them with an unimpressed pout.

Effie didn't ask what Cashmere Richmond had that _she_ didn't – she knew the answer, the answer was seven years less.

"It is not over yet." Seneca offered quietly.

She dearly hoped it wasn't.

* * *

 _Some plot is afoot! So what do you think? Will Effie end up using Haymitch for her own gain? Will she keep her escort gig? What's up with Plutarch and Elindra? Is the soulmate bond freaky or what? Let me know your thoughts!_


	7. Chapter 7

Effie only lasted another half hour at the event before pleading a headache to escape the suffocating party. She paid for her purchases but refused to take them with her, making a fuss until the owner – only too eager to please and court a prestigious customer base – agreed to have them delivered the next day. She waved Seneca off when he tried to walk her back to the car, knowing he would probably want to go out for late drinks.

She was eager to get home.

She was eager to get back to something that was paradoxically less and more complicated.

She spent the whole drive smocking and playing with her phone, wishing the driver would speed up a little, wondering if Haymitch would be there or…

She would have asked Darius first thing once she had reached her building's lobby but Darius was gone. The night shift was Thread's prerogative and Effie disliked the man. He was a professional doorman – right down to refusing to be called by his first name – but he also had cold eyes, was not particularly nice and seemed to despite humanity as a whole.

He nodded at her and answered her polite greeting with one of his own but it was usually the extent of their exchanges. She didn't find it in her to ask if Haymitch was there because she didn't want him to see her devastation if he wasn't.

She regretted not asking once the elevator doors had closed in front of her. Would Thread have let Haymitch up? She was certain Darius would have passed along her instructions but… With that man you simply never knew. Sometimes he liked being contradictory on purpose.

To distract herself, she tried to imagine what kind of soulmate words Thread could have to have become such a cruel bitter man. And then she decided it wasn't _that_ funny and nervously tapped her foot against the floor, her gaze glued to the red numbers flashing by.

She had a few neighbors but she never saw them. Most of them were famous just as she was, other were simply rich, few actually lived there. The apartments were investments more than anything else. The penthouse had been too at first, before she had seen it, fallen in love and decided to keep it for herself to her father's dismay – he had bought the property with her money with the hope of turning them into offices and selling them with a nice profit margin.

When the door opened, she strutted in, ready to make a show for the man no doubt eagerly waiting for her…

No one was waiting in front of the elevator. _Of course_. She couldn't expect him to stand there all night when he didn't know when she would be back.

The penthouse was dark though and it made her anxiety rise up as she made her way to the living-room. He _had_ sent messages earlier, he hadn't cut her out. He _wouldn't_ … _Would_ he? What did she know about him when all was said and done? That he was her soulmate? Would that stop him from leaving her behind without…

The living-room's light automatically flickered on when she stepped in and tossed her clutch on the kitchen counter.

There was a groan from the couch and, when she peered in that direction, she spotted two sock clad feet propped up on the armrest. Relief washed over her, so powerful her legs almost gave in.

He must have fallen asleep and the motion sensor had stopped detecting him and had turned the lights off. It happened sometimes.

With a smile on her lips, she walked around the couch and could only smile harder when she found him lying on his back, an arm tossed over his eyes, his button-up shirt already half undone. Clearly he had made himself comfortable.

She didn't resist the urge to sit down on the small space left between his hip and the edge of the couch. She leaned down slowly and pressed a soft kiss on his lips. He responded to it lazily, without taking his arm off his face or making an effort to greet her properly.

"What did I say about startling me?" he grumbled against her lips. "All the more so when I sleep?"

"I knew you were not asleep." she argued, stealing a new peck and another one just because she could. Kissing felt so good. She felt so much better already. All the strain from earlier, the stress… It was washing out, chased by his lips.

"You knew that, yeah?" he mocked, finally taking his arm away from his face only to wrap it around her waist. His eyes were tired and she figured he _had_ been asleep before she had walked in and woken him up.

"Yes, I did." she insisted in a matter-of-fact sort of voice. "I am also giving you fair warning that I am going to straddle you in a second."

She almost expected a protest because he had been quite clear earlier that morning that it would take time for him to trust her enough to accept it but while his body tensed a little, he didn't object so she went on with her plan and slowly slipped a leg on the other side of his hips. There wasn't much space and her calf was digging into the back of the couch but the discomfort wasn't enough to stop her.

His smirk was a slow sexy thing. "Nice view. Would be better if you were naked."

She pursed her lips to fight her smile, knowing her twinkling eyes probably betrayed her. "Would it? Perhaps you should do something about that, then."

In a moment he was sitting, his legs bent behind her and she was propped up, trapped between his chest and his thighs, sitting on something that was quickly hardening. His mouth found her neck and he made a sound of annoyance when he tasted the heavy layer of foundation that had been necessary to cover the bite marks. He touched her hair, tried to bury his fingers in the hairdo and sort of froze only to slowly drew back, holding his hand in the air. He studied it with a disgusted face.

"Tell me the truth, sweetheart…" he taunted. "Did the hairspray can survive?"

She shoved him back, huffing with irritation, but he didn't let himself get pushed away. He chuckled, the sound a rough rumble that came from deep in his chest, and buried his face between her breasts, her arms encircling her to keep her in place.

"Are you going to call me by a clown name again?" she asked, her lips pursed, trying to resist the urge to drop her head back because he was nuzzling the dress down and it felt _really_ good.

"Trying not to." he deadpanned. "But you make it hard."

"Yes, I do seem to make things _hard_ for you, do I not?" She grinned a salacious grin and found her vengeance by rotating her hips slowly, tearing a groan from his throat.

He looked up, propping his chin on her chest. "You're still sore?"

He asked it casually, as if it wasn't a big deal at all if she was, as if he wasn't quickly becoming hard for her… As if he wasn't so desperate to _fuck_ her right there and then…

She could feel it.

The power of his lust.

She could _feel_ it inside her chest and it was so weird and so wonderful at the same time… It was a vague echo to her own desires but it felt so good to know he wanted her, that he wanted her so much he was actually _showing restrain._ He wanted her. Just like that. No… She realized a heartbeat later, not just like that but anywhere, _everywhere_. In any shape or form. Wherever she would let him have her. However she would let him have her. He wanted _her_.

"Hey." he said, sounding alarmed and she didn't understand why until he cupped her cheeks in his hands, his thumbs retracing the hard lines of her cheekbones. She was crying. "Hey, _hey_ … Sweetheart, it's fine… If you're not up to it, we don't do anything. No problem. Come on, stop…"

He sounded so awkwardly out of his depths, so sorry to have made her cry… She shot forward and kissed him hard, still crying a little, trying to convey just how much she wanted him back. Because she _did_. All of him. All the time. Anywhere and everywhere. In any shape or form. However he would let her have him. She wanted him.

It was a scary realization to make after only twenty-four hours of acquaintance but something slid in place for her at that moment. Perhaps she hadn't truly understood what having a soulmate _meant_ before. She had recognized the concept, had a vague idea of what it entailed, but, right then, she _felt_ it.

There was no sound, no light show, nothing outwardly changed… And yet she knew the bond had finally settled. On her end at least.

Was it because of the aggressive kissing or the unexpected surge of feelings through the bond she didn't know but Haymitch dropped down on his back again, taking her with him, kissing back harder if possible… He was overwhelmed. She knew he was overwhelmed. She was overwhelmed too. The whole bond was overwhelmed.

She barely noticed when he rolled her under him because she was too busy tangling her fingers in his hair to keep him close, to keep his mouth on hers.

"Mine." he growled against her lips. He had claimed her once already, earlier that day in the bakery, and she felt the same shiver of pleasure at the possessive tone. It was stronger this time, though, because of the words he didn't say. The words that still echoed clearly in her head, in his voice.

 _Mine to protect._

 _Mine to keep._

"Mine." She heard the word slip out but was barely conscious of it. She nibbled down on his bottom lip until he allowed her entrance again.

 _Mine to keep._

 _Mine to love._

He must have heard her thoughts – or at least a weird echo of her thoughts – because his head shot back suddenly and he stared at her, his breathing hard and labored.

Panic was obvious on his face but no matter how much she tried to reach through the connection between them, she couldn't tell what else he was feeling. Somehow, she suspected they had fried the bond.

She slowly, very slowly as not to spook him, strained her neck until she could peck his lips. Her mouth was tingling from the kisses, her chin itched from the stubble burn… She drew him back. Peck by peck. Until he closed his eyes and kissed her again, his whole body sagging as if in an inevitable surrender.

It became frantic after that.

She couldn't remember taking his shirt off but she must have because soon it was skin under her palms, the faint scars on his back she hadn't yet had time to explore. She opened her legs for him, bracketing his hips as he romped against hers. Her soulmate words rubbing against the rough fabric of his pants…

His mouth was everywhere. Her neck, her chest…

She wanted to reach for him but she couldn't get to his belt when he was lying on top of her like that…

"I need you…" she eventually whined, not even caring how pathetic she must have sounded.

The straps of fabric that made up the lower part of her dress were getting in the way and he growled in irritation. She had the very strong suspicion he was about to tear the dress in two and when he grabbed the fabric a little less carefully that it probably deserved, she gripped his wrists, some sanity slowly coming back…

"Wait." she urged. He didn't like that. He grumbled and rubbed against her quicker. He was really hard now and probably more than ready. "Haymitch, that dress costs a lot of money and it's a loan. I will be in trouble if we damage it."

That seemed to do the trick. He rolled off her with a groan and almost tumbled off the couch in the process. It must have cleared his head a little though because he slowly sat up and stared at her.

"I'm gonna say it again…" he scoffed as she stood up. "This soulmate thing's making me crazy."

"You and I both." she laughed, easily locating the hidden zipper. She carefully eased out of the dress before draping it over the back of an armchair. It wasn't the sexiest striptease but at least she wasn't in any danger of having to explain why the overpriced dress was damaged. When she turned back, Haymitch's eyes were wide as saucers, his pants were open and he had a hand inside his underwear. The way he was looking at her… "What is it?"

He looked debauched, sitting there bare-chested touching himself with a collection of bite marks all over his torso. She loved the sight.

"You don't have underwear." he commented.

She wasn't sure if he sounded astonished or shocked or appreciative.

She automatically ran her hand over her bare breast and let it travel down to her sex. "It would have showed."

He licked his lips and kept staring, his hand moving up and down in a steady rhythm. "You went out without panties."

"I… often do." she confessed, tilting her head to the side, not quite sure of what was going on.

"It wasn't even a real dress." he said. "Could see your legs when you walked."

Ah. So _that_ was the issue.

As if she would ever risk accidentally showing something nobody should see… Although Seneca might love the idea. An accident like that would guarantee some publicity…

"It is designed that way." she dismissed, strutting back toward him. "It was perfectly secured, I promise."

She tried to sit back down on his lap but his hands shot to her hips and held her up. Then his nose was nuzzling her pubic bone.

"Mine." he grumbled. He breathed against her sensitive skin and she automatically widened her stance a little. "All mine…"

He licked her soulmate words. Her inner thigh had never been that sensitive and it shouldn't have been _that_ erotic. His teeth nipped at the skin and her head flew back. She grabbed his shoulders for purchase even as he properly moved his head between her legs.

It didn't take long for him to make her come and when she did, it was so powerful, her legs almost gave in. He kissed up her stomach, her ribs…

She felt dazed when he stood up and she could only wrap her arms around his neck, bury her face in his shoulder… He picked her up bridal style and she let him, forgetting to worry about the strain to his injury, forgetting to worry about anything but the skin that wasn't readily accessible to her lips…

He placed her down on her bed but remained standing to the side and she whimpered in protest, her arms stretched out for him, her legs indecently open in the oldest invite in the world…

Her brain eventually processed what the delay was about when she saw him take off his pants, underwear and socks. Then he was on her again, probing at her entrance and she sighed in bliss.

"Gorgeous…" he muttered, kissing her neck, her jaw, her ear… "So gorgeous…"

The word was a balm on a wound that had opened earlier in the car. She didn't want to think about _the Escort_ right then though. She didn't want think about anything that wasn't _this_ right there.

When she felt him reach for the bedside drawer, looking for condoms, she placed a hand on his arm, reached between them for his erection…

"Don't…" she whispered. "I want to feel you… I want to feel _you_ …"

He paused and, for a second, she was sure he would let her have her way.

"You're on the pill?" he asked.

"I…" she hesitated, not sure how to explain. She was on the pill but she wasn't as diligent about it as was wise. Not that it mattered anyway because… But there was no way to explain all that in a few sentences and…

"It's alright, princess…" he replied, his voice rough and soothing. "You said you weren't sure it was a good idea yesterday…"

Because she wasn't sure she was clean, the voice of reason that was buried under pleasure supplied.

He didn't make it sound reproachful though, just a statement of fact.

She let out a disappointed sigh but nuzzled his shoulder, gently pumping him up and down until he found the condom. They rolled it on together.

When he entered her, her eyes rolled back.

The soulmate bond made its comeback, full force. She could feel Haymitch's pleasure on top of her own and it was…

 _Too much…_

 _Too much…_

" _Fuck_ …" he panted in her ear. " _Fuck, fuck, fuck_ … I'm gonna… Effie, I'm sorry I've got…"

She wasn't anywhere near ready to come but when he found his release, his pleasure was so overwhelming that it took her with it. It was odd. Not quite an orgasm but just as powerful. And that bliss it triggered in her was reflected back right to him which in turn sent her back right to her… The loop was never ending and far too much…

She passed out.

* * *

 _Possibly Effie is brain dead now XD Did you enjoy this chapter? Let me know!_

 _There won't be an update for this story next week and there won't be any update for vampires for two week-ends! I shall be back on the 18th all things willing!_


	8. Chapter 8

It took a whole minute for Haymitch to rouse Effie after he stopped having what he could have sworn was a heart attack. It certainly had been an attack of some sort. Could someone die from too much pleasure? Could the soulmate bond kill them?

"Hey, sweetheart…" he whispered gently, his voice raw. He felt dizzy, his limbs were all shaking and he wasn't sure he wasn't about to pass out from the sensory overload he had just gone through. "Come on… Wake up…"

Her eyelids fluttered open and closed, her gaze passed over his face without a spark of recognition. She looked as dazed as he felt.

But at least she was conscious…

"Stay awake." he mumbled for her as much as for himself. And then he snorted the old joke he usually shared with Chaff on missions. "Stay alive."

When Effie made an obvious effort to keep her eyelids open and even to try and reach for the water bottle on the nightstand, he forced himself to roll off the condom. He tried to stand up to dispatch it in the bathroom but it soon turned out not to be the greatest idea. His legs wouldn't hold his weight. He wisely decided to choose his battles, tied the condom and placed it on the floor to get rid of it later before lying back down.

Effie, meanwhile, had managed to sit up and was eagerly gulping down the water without even pausing to breathe. Some trickled down her chin and he followed the small rivulet with his eyes as it fell to her breasts, not even sure how he could manage to still stir at the sight after what had just happened. For a moment, he even feared the whole weird kaleidoscopic bliss thing would start again.

Either they had fried the bond for now or it was a one-time-thing because all he got from that strange instinct he was quickly growing used to was _exhaustion_ and, yet again, it was very vague. Maybe he was just imagining it because she _looked_ exhausted, her make-up smudged and her fancy hairdo now shapeless despite the hairspray still keeping random puffy heaps of hair up and in place.

She looked a bit of a fright, truth be told, and he might have smirked if that whole experience hadn't shaken him up so much.

"The _fuck_ was that?" he asked once she was done drinking. The plastic bottle had lost its shape and she discarded it, panting a little.

"I… I do not know…" she rasped out. Her throat must have been sore. She had screamed, hadn't she? He remembered she had screamed, a scream that had almost sounded painful. "The bond… I think it settled for good…"

She wriggled back down and he automatically opened an arm, breathing more easily once she was snuggled against his chest. Her hand fell on his soulmate words and a knot of tension loosened between his shoulder blades.

"Yeah…" he confirmed. "I felt it…"

When she had kissed him after she had started crying for no good reason he had been able to tell. He had felt it slide into place with something that had felt… _definite_. He had even heard… He had _thought_ he had heard her thoughts just as clearly as if she had spoken them out loud.

 _Mine to keep. Mine to love._

Oh, he didn't want to linger on that last one… He really _didn't_. He wasn't ready for that. He wasn't ready for any of this and the urge to run away, to lock himself in his house and drink himself to oblivion was almost overwhelming.

"Do you think…" she hesitated. "Do you think it will be like that every time now?"

Her hair was tickling the underside of his chin but he still let his head roll to the side and propped it on hers.

"Hope not." he snorted. "I like mind blowing sex, don't get me wrong… But I'm not on board with it _literally_ trying to blow my mind…"

She muffled her laughter into his chest. There was a hysterical edge to her chuckles but he let it slide. He felt a bit hysterical too.

 _Mine to keep… Mine to love_ …

"Perhaps we should try again?" she suggested. "To know for sure."

He shrugged good-naturedly, knowing neither of them would be up for anything for a few hours yet so it wasn't really costing him anything to agree. It wasn't like he would be able to keep his hands off her forever anyway. They were _bound_ to try again at some point. "Worse ways to die…"

"I should have known you would be the death of me." she joked.

It was a stupid expression. Something people used without even thinking about it.

It made him flinch.

If the muscles in his legs hadn't still been twitching, he might have fled.

"Hey." she whispered, reaching up to cup his cheek. " _Hey_." She pressed a soft kiss on his lips. "It is alright, Haymitch." Another soft soothing kiss and his fears abated a little.

Not completely.

 _Mine to love_.

At some point, he needed to tell her that everyone who ever got close enough to love him had a nasty tendency to die.

Was he going to be the death of her?

He had been the death of a lot of other people…

"I should go." he mumbled, his throat closing up. It was the reasonable thing to do, after all, go and make sure she would be safe. She wasn't going to be safe sleeping next to him that was for certain. She might say whatever she wanted, at some point, she would either sleep too deeply to notice his night terrors or she would try to comfort him and then… He would hurt her. And he didn't want to hurt her. Leaving was the sensible conduct. And yet he was half hoping she would hold him back anyway.

And she did not disappoint.

"Do not be ridiculous." She pouted. "I missed you. I want you to stay. I _need_ you to stay."

He had missed her too.

Those hours far from her had been _agony_. He had been a ball of nerves. He had tried to read but had ended up pacing the length of his house and cleaning some more if only to avoid touching the bottles of liquor scattered on the kitchen counter. The anxiety of being away from her… The anxiety _full point_ once he had denied himself a drink…

He felt good now. He felt _right_. Like he was where he belonged pressed against her.

"Okay." he surrendered without much of a fight.

It was worth it if only for the bright smile on her lips. "Good."

She turned around and wriggled until she could use his arm as a pillow and her back was against his side and then she reached behind her for his other arm and pulled until he was spooning her, half draped over her. He passed his leg over hers and his hand found her breast. In the cocoon of his body, she let out a sigh of contentment he accidentally echoed against her head.

If there hadn't been so much hairspray and her hair weren't sticky and reeking of chemical products, it would have been perfect. But he wasn't going to nitpick.

"You are so warm…" she hummed. "I love that you are so warm… I always get cold."

 _Because you're skin and bone_ , he almost challenged but his eyelids were drooping. "Remember if I have a nightmare…"

"You won't have a nightmare." she countered and she sounded so _sure_ …

"So bossy…" he teased. "What you're gonna do? _Order_ my night terrors away?"

"If that is what it takes…" she replied very seriously. "I declare you will sleep like a baby tonight and have zero nightmare."

She was stubborn enough that it might even work. He dozed off with a smirk on his lips.

Despite her best wishes, it wasn't the deep restful slumber from the previous night and, truth be told, he hadn't been expecting to sleep like that again – he hadn't slept like that in decades. Sleep came in short bouts of slumber that had him waking up often although he didn't startle and he didn't dream, which was already a win.

Something felt off every time he opened his eyes but he was too tired and not awake enough to put his finger on it. It was only in the middle of the night, when he remained awake for a full minute that he realized what it was that disturbed him.

Effie wasn't sleeping.

She wasn't tossing and turning either. They were still spooning, she was still in his arms, relaxed and he would not have thought anything about it if she hadn't been pulling at a loose thread on the pillow case. He was pretty sure the only reason she would ever pull at a loose thread on a pillow case was because she was worried.

He carefully tried to probe at that place in his mind he thought the bond to be. He wasn't sure he would have qualified it as _instinct_ now. It felt more like a sixth sense. A sixth sense of her. He was a little scared probing would trigger an overload again but what he got was still fairly vague. An echo. Fainter than what he had felt when she had been so upset earlier and he had been too far away to do anything about it.

It had been terrible.

She had been upset all afternoon. He had known that as surely as he was of his own feelings. She had been upset and anxious about being separated and he had shared those feelings which, he supposed, had started feeding that weird loop of emotions through the bond. But in the evening, something had shifted. Suddenly, what he had got through the bond had been… _different_. If he had been forced to put a name on it he would have said it was pure panic and then she had been upset, _truly_ upset and he had immediately texted her without even thinking to pause that he hadn't known her long enough to harass her with that many messages. He hadn't gotten much of anything through the bond after that so he had believed her when she had said she was alright.

But maybe she wasn't _that_ alright.

"Can't sleep?" he mumbled against her hair, automatically tightening his hold on her.

"Did I wake you?" she worried.

Her voice had none of the rough quality of sleep and that made him a little more alert. It wasn't just that she had woken up, she had either been awake a while or she hadn't slept at all. His mind flashed back to the bakery and what she had confessed about sleeping pills. Was it still a problem for her? Cause insomnia… He got that. _Hell_ , they could probably keep each other company when it struck from now on.

"Nah. Just ain't a big sleeper." he denied. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." She said it too quickly and too cheerfully. And he could still feel it through the bond… She was sad now. Worried still but sad.

He wanted to press the issue, ask if it was about him, if maybe she was reconsidering the wisdom of getting involved with someone who had as much emotional baggage as he did… If it was too scary for her – because he could tell underneath the sadness and the worry, there was also some fear…

He chose the coward's way out and didn't ask.

He had known her a little more than a day and already he knew that now that he had tasted it, he could never go back to being without her.

But the thought that she might be scared of him, that she might be upset to be bound to him… Oh, he could understand it, of course, he had spent the last twenty-four hours warning her she deserved better and she should let him go. But the idea that she might actually be too polite or kind to reject him…

"Why are you so sad?" she asked suddenly, a touch of alarm in her voice. Her fingers coiled around his wrist, squeezed. "I _promise_ you it is nothing of importance."

That was not true.

And he could have told her he _wasn't_ sad, he could have let out a gibe and deflected the question – he _would_ have had she been anyone else – but she would have been able to tell because she probably could read his feelings just as clearly as he could read hers.

"Maybe we should agree when we don't want to talk about something we just say that." he said slowly. "Cause the lying… The lying ain't gonna work."

She twisted her upper body a little so she could see him properly. She looked sorry.

"It is not about you, darling…" she whispered. "It is just something about work… I _promise_. It is silly and it will solve itself out and I should not let it worry me so. It has _nothing_ to do with you and me."

 _You and me_ …

 _Fuck_ but he liked the sound of that too much.

It terrified him how much he liked the sound of that.

He studied her hard, searched her eyes for the lie… He couldn't find anything but genuine regret in them. In the end, he scowled. "Are you hearing my thoughts again? Cause _that_ was _fucking_ freaky."

A slow smile stretched her lips. "No. I have just known you long enough to know you will always somehow think it is about you not being good enough for me."

He blinked. "You've known me a day."

" _Exactly_." she huffed and then she turned back around to nestle in his arms once more. "You really should stop thinking so low of yourself. I am proud to have you as my soulmate."

 _Proud…_

He wasn't sure when someone had been proud of him for the last time.

She squeezed his wrist.

"Go back to sleep." she encouraged him. "I am fine. Simply brooding."

"Can brood with you, you know." he grumbled. "I'm very good at brooding."

"But there are so many funnier things we could be doing…" she teased.

He felt better but still not up to much and he doubted she did either. The banter was fun though and he nuzzled her nape.

"Sleep first." he demanded. "You too."

"I am not much of a sleeper either." she sighed. "But I suppose you are right. I do have a fitting tomorrow and I cannot look like a zombie."

He didn't know what a fitting was and he didn't ask. Work stuff, for sure. He wasn't that interested in that part of her life. It seemed too… fake. And too removed from what he knew.

What he did know about glitter and spotlights? All he had ever known was sweat and blood.

Her thumb was drawing slow circles on his wrist, his side was numb from having stayed too long in that position and it was becoming very obvious after a few minutes that neither of them would go back to sleep anytime soon. Slowly, he extricated himself from her embrace and shuffled back until he could lie on his stomach, his head turned toward her. She settled on her back and watched him with an inquisitive, almost uncertain, gaze.

He gathered the pillow under his head, his chin slightly propped on his forearm and he studied her in the semi-darkness. They hadn't pulled the curtains again or rolled down the blinds and the lights from the city outside reflected in the room. The sheets were pooling around her stomach but she didn't seem to care about being exposed to his hungry eyes and he loved that, how uninhibited she was.

"I've decided to give sobriety a go." he announced even though he hadn't been planning to. He resolutely ignored the pulsing ball of terror those words triggered in his stomach. She could probably feel it anyway but… "Ain't making any promise." he added before she could answer. "Don't like making promises I can't keep."

He would fail.

Of course, he would.

He would go back to liquor because he always did eventually. He had stopped drinking for missions that had lasted months at times but when the deed was done, he always ended up going on binges. And without the prospect of any mission to come…

"It is enough that you try." she whispered, flashing him a blinding smile. "Recovery is a process."

She was proud, he realized, proud of him and happy. Relieved a little too.

He wasn't sure how to deal with all of that. He wasn't used to having someone who cared for him like that anymore. He…

"Funny." he snorted, choosing deflection because it was easier and because he wasn't sure he wanted to go deep into that right then. "My doctor always says the same thing."

The man had said it time and time again as Haymitch watched the plastic bags attached to his body with distaste, afraid that he would be forced to be hooked up to them forever. Thirty and forced to see his _shit_ and piss in a bag forever because his bowels had been torn apart…

His recovery was a miracle. The doctor had said so repeatedly and while Haymitch had sneered every time that they would have done better to let him die, he was aware of it. The repairs on his body were works of art and he had been _lucky_.

Effie turned on her side to face him. She didn't reach for him, didn't breach the short distance between them, but he felt her gaze caress his face anyway. He had averted his eyes at some point, he wasn't sure when.

"What happened?" she asked.

Her voice was hushed, weighted down by feelings he couldn't clearly decipher through the bond. Fear maybe, fear because he had almost died without meeting her first. Anger too, he thought. Anger because he had been terribly hurt and she hadn't been there to protect him – which was ridiculous on a hundred of levels…

"I can't tell you." he grumbled.

"Alright." She immediately backed off, the fake cheerful smile returning to her lips, schooling her features into something neutral that did nothing to hide the rejection she acutely felt – he was starting to suspect they could work on their best poker face yet they would never be able to hide anything from each other ever again. "We did agree we would not go into heavy stuff just yet."

"No." he corrected her with a sigh. "I _really_ can't tell you. It's classified."

That kind of _fucking bullshit_ always was.

"Oh." she let out, sounding a touch relieved that he wasn't refusing to tell her because he wanted to hold back. "Can you tell me… Was it… Was it _very_ close?"

 _Very close_ _to_ _what_?, he wanted to scoff, _Dying?_

How close had it come?

A breath?

A second?

A _fucking_ excellent medic in the chopper that had evacuated him?

"Can tell you guts are _fucking_ slippery and _disgusting_ and I ran like hell to jump off a _fucking_ cliff and into a _fucking_ chopper thinking I was gonna drop them and trip on my own _fucking_ entrails and die there and it would be the most _fucking_ stupid death of all time." he spat.

He felt the shot of phantom pain in his stomach like he always did when he talked about it – when he _thought_ about it, he hadn't talked about it before that moment yet, not really, not like _that_. He had made his report once he had been awake, had typed a brief mission report for his superiors, had summed up that part of the sorry tale in as few words as possible… He hadn't even talked about it with Chaff yet. Chaff had already been in the chopper, half-dead himself, his hand hanging on by a few tendons…

He had seen a lot of ugly stuff in his life but Chaff's hand… He had wanted to throw up when he had assessed the injury earlier on, before the explosions, before the cliff. And then, while running for his life trying to keep his guts inside, he had thought how _fucking_ ironical it was that his own injury was even worse to look at. A gaping hole in his stomach.

And the pain…

Oh, the pain…

The memory was too strong, impossible to ignore or bury. Every time he thought about that day, he felt it again, fresh and new, and…

Effie gasped, _gagged…_

" _Shit_." He propped himself on his elbow, reached for her shoulder even as she flopped on her back and pressed a hand on her mouth… She looked all too pale and, for a second, he thought she was going to puke right there. "Easy. Breathe. I'm sorry… I'm _sorry_. Breathe, sweetheart…"

It took several minutes and a lot of deep breathing for her to stop shaking like a leaf. When she did, she cannonballed into his arms and he held her tight, burying his nose against her shoulder, slowly shifting so he could adjust his grip on her.

"That _pain_ …" she half-sobbed.

He didn't know how to tell her that it was just a memory, that as fucking terrible as it was, the real thing had been _far_ worse…

"It's over." he said and he wasn't sure which one of them he was talking to. He needed the reminder sometimes or he would remain stuck in that memory, replay it on a loop. "It's over…"

Her leg wrapped around his thigh and she snuggled impossibly closer to him. "You almost _died,_ Haymitch."

He had died.

His heart had stopped several times. They had brought him back because the medic had been stubborn and determined to bring back what was left of the team alive but he _had_ died.

"I'm here now." he murmured in her ear.

Her distress was killing him.

He could feel it. Terrible and deep and so _genuine_ …

Twenty-four hours. How could she feel so deeply for him after only twenty-four hours?

But didn't he care for her too now? She was his soulmate. For better or for worse they were linked. And if he let himself think about losing her – having lost her before even meeting her… The thought hurt so much that he almost couldn't _bear_ it…

"You are _never_ going back." she vowed and there was so much strength in her voice, so much _hatred_ for whoever had sent him into danger in the first place… "It is a good thing you are not a soldier anymore because I would _never_ have let you go back."

He bristled at the idea of her _letting_ him do anything but understood enough of the feelings behind it that he didn't actually voiced his irritation.

"That ship has sailed." he said slowly. "And good riddance."

It wasn't until he had said it aloud that he realized just how relieved he was. The army was all he had ever known and while he had always thought it was a soul-eating monster, while he had always bitterly claimed they made him a killer, while he had never really managed to submit to the necessary discipline that had cost him more than one opportunity to rise up the ranks, the army had also become a safe place in a twisted way. The only place where people understood what he felt, how he functioned… The only place where _fucked up_ people like him could still be of use… The only place where he could find some sort of makeshift family…

"Mine." she growled. The kiss she planted on his lips was frantic, _possessive_. " _Mine."_

And she would never let anyone take him away from her again.

And, to be honest, he pitied anyone who would ever try because…

Effie Trinket, international model, could be more frightening than some of the worst bloodthirsty soldiers he had ever known.

He kissed her back just as frantically, feeling himself stir despite everything when she started touching him with clear intent. A part of him advised caution because of what had happened with the bond, the greatest part didn't care. If he died _fucking_ her, it would be a good death.

And _fucking_ was the right term.

She was _feral_.

He wasn't sure what had gotten into her, fear or anger or… Her hands were everywhere, her nails clawed his skin as if she wanted to slip under it, her kisses were all teeth and bites… He gave back in kind: his touch was rough, his hips brutal and he made her beg for release until she sobbed his name against his neck…

The bond didn't feed the loop of pleasure, it was a distant hum at the back of his mind where he could feel her desire without getting flooded by it.

They were panting and sweaty when they finally came, clinging to each other like drowning people to a lifeline. He didn't slip out of her immediately. It felt too good to be in her. The feeling of completion, of _peace_ … It was hard to let go of.

He wondered how it would feel without a condom. He had never done it without one, had no frame of comparison and yet he already knew it would only heighten the already mind blowing experience.

He opened his eyes to find her watching him, their breaths mingled together…

There was a storm of emotions raging in his chest but he forced them down. It was too early. They were too scary. She was too perfect.

She cupped his cheek and kissed him hard.

He wasn't sure if she had gotten an echo of that storm or not.

He certainly was getting the warm blossoming feeling in her heart.

And _fuck_ wasn't it more terrifying than having to run for your life holding your guts inside your body…

* * *

 _Back to business! Did you enjoy this chapter? Let me know!_


	9. Chapter 9

Haymitch's whole body tensed and that tore Effie away from her not quite slumber.

Effie had never been an easy sleeper, a few hours of rest stolen here and there had always been enough to keep her going when she didn't have sleeping pills to make her fall like a log – and she hadn't touched sleeping pills for two years. Somehow, it was fitting that her soulmate was the same. They hadn't really fallen back asleep after that last round of sex but they had snuggled close and they had let themselves doze off into their own daydreams in a comfortable silence. She had been a little relieved that the bond hadn't tried to kill them with pleasure again.

She waited a handful of seconds but when his hand didn't resume the slow petting of her hair and he didn't relax, she frowned and cautiously probed at the soulmate bond. She was a little reluctant to do so because for all intent and purpose, it felt like an invasion of his privacy. And yet it was so _natural_ to just… _reach_ for it… It almost felt like the connection had always been there, like it was just as normal to try and _sense_ what was wrong as it would be to ask him out loud.

She got a dull echo of worry and not much else.

"Haymitch?" she whispered.

He shushed her.

It was a harsh sound but it hurt less than it did when he took his arms away from around her and sat up, tossing the sheets and blankets to the side. She felt rejected and, for a second, she was scared he had somehow figured out what Seneca had told her the previous night and was not interested in her anymore now that she was in danger of becoming _no-one_ but it only lasted a second. First because her fears had more to do with her own abandonment issues and then because there was a hard look on his face, a _dangerous_ look.

"There's someone inside the penthouse." he told her after another long second she spent frozen stiff next to him, clutching the sheets to her chest in a stupid reflex.

His grey eyes darted around the room and she had the distinct feeling he was looking for a potential weapon. It made a shiver ran down her spine.

"It's just Lavinia." she rushed in reassuring him, dropping the sheet to reach for him. The muscle of his arm was strong and contracted. She glanced at the clock to be sure, because his fear was contagious thanks to the bond, but the sun had been up for long enough that she was relatively certain.

He relaxed but not entirely. "Lavinia?"

"The help." she insisted. "It is fine. You are safe."

Familiar noises were drifting throughout the penthouse. Lavinia quietly unloading groceries in the kitchen, probably getting a move on with the dusting… She wouldn't start hoovering until Effie got up not to wake her up. Lavinia was a pearl and the soul of discretion, Effie loved her for it.

It took a long time for Haymitch's gaze to travel from the open door to her. "Ain't _me_ I'm worried about. _I_ ain't the international model every psycho fantasizes about here."

She smiled despite herself. She hated that he was so skittish he worried at the smallest noise and immediately jumped to the worst conclusions but she liked that he worried about _her_. "I usually keep the door close." She glanced at the clock again. "The alarm will ring in a few minutes."

He flopped back down on his back and watched her, his gaze traveling over her exposed upper body with a calm sort of hunger. It was so tempting to turn off the alarm, cancel her morning training session again and remain in bed until she _absolutely_ had to leave for her fitting… Quick calculations told her she could squeeze some more minutes with her soulmate if they were fast about it, so she did turn the alarm off and she leaned in to kiss him.

He responded to the kiss immediately but grabbed her wrist when she tried to take him in hand.

"Door's open." he mumbled.

An echo of unease rolled over her through the bond and she more or less deduced he wasn't quite on board with having sex when a stranger was on the floor with them. She kissed him again but relocated her hand to the safer place of his scar, to the damaged soulmate words. He snorted.

"What is it?" she whispered, bumping her nose against his cheek.

"Wish I could touch yours as easy as you touch mine." he confessed, his hand hooking around the back of her leg. The tip of his fingers didn't even brush against her soulmate words. They were too well hidden.

She shifted her leg so it was half draped over his lap and he could slid his hand up to the very top of her inner thigh. She regretted it when the back of his hand brushed against her core because she really wanted more of him and, given his smirk, he must have been aware – either through the bond or because she was being obvious.

"I need a shower." she sighed, dropping a kiss on his shoulder.

She waited for him to offer to follow her in the bathroom but all he did was stretch his arms over his head. Something audibly popped in his back.

"I need food." he declared. "You think your maid's gonna mind if I go poking?"

"She will mind being called my _maid_." Effie teased. "She is my housekeeper, titles are important. And just tell her what you want to eat, she will fix it for you."

"I can do my own cooking." he grumbled.

 _So stubborn_ …

"Suit yourself." she replied and sneaked out of bed and to the bathroom.

She grinned to herself when she felt his eyes following her naked body right up until she closed the door. It was good to feel desired.

She made a face when she caught sight of herself in the mirror and crashed down from her high though. She looked like a mess of smudged make-up and tangled stiff hair sticky with hairspray. How he could _desire_ her when she looked like that, she didn't know. The _Bozo_ comment wouldn't have been unjustified right then.

She closed her eyes and tilted her head back to let the water stream down her body once she was in the shower, already reaching for her bottle of shampoo. She felt both exhausted and elated, not an uncommon mix for her.

She would need to feed her social medias before Brutus arrived. Perhaps even _while_ Brutus was there. A few pictures of her exercising and preaching about the good of doing sports would be a hit. It always was. She would take a few more at Portia's fitting…

 _Were_ they about to give her contract to Cashmere? They looked a little alike, that was true. They were both tall, blond with clear eyes and the transition would be made easier by that, even though the public might be attached to her so it might sway the decision her way. But Cashmere was younger which would play in _her_ advantage.

She splashed water on her face and tried to keep the rising anxiety to a minimum. She would get through this. It was a little bump in the road. If it came to that, she would simply corner Plutarch Heavensbee and appeal to his close friendship with her mother. _Hell_ , for _The_ _Escort_ she would even go to Elindra directly and beg for help.

Her hand paused on her right side as she smeared shower gel over her body. The memory of the pain she had felt the previous night distracting her from her own worries. _Haymitch's_ pain. It had only been an echo, his own memory being too vivid but… She had thought she was going to _die_ from the echo of that memory alone. She couldn't even imagine going through the real thing.

Even simply thinking back about it…

She closed her eyes again, took a deep breath, half expected the terrible pain in her stomach to flare again…

Someone had gutted her soulmate like a pig. Someone had almost taken him from her before she had even met him. And that… Oh, that made her more furious than even Cashmere and her play for power or the treachery of _GameMaker Inc_ and Seneca's lack of honesty.

Given how he had looked when she walked in the bathroom and despite his claims that he was hungry, she expected to find Haymitch still lounging on her bed and was a little disappointed to find the room empty.

She found him in the kitchen, bare-chested and barefoot, his grey pants for only clothing, frying something in a pan she hadn't known she owned. He looked so good like that… Tangled hair, hands surely adding salt and pepper and whatever those spice bottles were, focused on something that smelt so good her mouth watered even more…

Her gaze retraced the hard lines of his back, lingering on the small scars scattered here and there… He turned his head when she came in, his own eyes taking her in… She resisted the urge to blush because she knew she looked quite different from her glamorous self – that was why pictures of her exercising were always so popular, it made her look less fashion goddess and more human. She was wearing skin-tight grey yoga pants, a neon pink sports bra and her hair was separated in two messy French braids. She had also kept the make-up to a minimum, knowing that she would end up sweating like a pig – there was a reason she _staged_ pictures _before_ actually doing anything strenuous.

"You're gonna jog?" he asked, sounding slightly interested and slightly apprehensive.

"There's a private coach who comes four mornings a week. I need to keep in shape." she explained, spotting the white shirt he hadn't bothered to put on folded over the back of the couch next to her dress. Her housekeeper's doing no doubt. She perched on one of the stools on the kitchen side of the counter. "Where is Lavinia?"

She wouldn't have minded a smoothie.

"Think I scared her off." he grumbled, turning back to his pan. "Didn't even say a word to me."

"She would not be able to." Effie hummed. "She is mute. Not deaf, though, so do not be inconsiderate."

Past lovers had been before and she had broken up with them over it. She was fond of the young redhead girl even if communication was sometimes problematic. Lavinia had taught her a few signs but mostly, they talked through texts and notes. In the last three years, Effie had never found cause to complain about her. Her instructions were always respected to the letter and Lavinia's hand in things was always unseen and unheard, like the best help ought to be. Even _Elindra_ had never found anything derogatory to say about her and Effie had long suspected her mother was eager to steal her off.

Haymitch shot her a surprised look but didn't comment. She was a little annoyed he would be surprised that she would employ a disabled person. Did he think her a monster?

"How do you like your eggs?" he asked. "I've got scrambled ones if you like that."

And it smelt terribly good. All the more so when he turned around and put some on a plate. She wanted the eggs. She really truly did.

But Cashmere and her narrow waist were breathing down her neck.

"I do not eat much in the morning." she countered. "I will only have an apple."

The bowl on the counter was full of fresh fruits, Lavinia's doing no doubt.

Haymitch's hand shot out and grabbed her wrist before she could take it. He was frowning. "You're starving and you want the eggs."

She narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips. "I think we need to talk about _boundaries_ when it comes to that bond, Haymitch."

His eyebrows shot up. "Didn't get that through the bond. You're staring at these eggs like a dog at a juicy bone."

As if on cue, her stomach rumbled and he flashed her a triumphant smirk.

She dropped her hand and surrendered because she _did_ want the eggs. Still, he looked far too smug when he slid a plate in front of her.

"Yesterday it was a chocolate muffin, today scrambled eggs…" she grumbled, stepping around him to place a new capsule in her coffee machine. She needed coffee to start the day. Perhaps two cups even. "You are going to make me _fat_." She waited for the remark about her being too thin again but it seemed he had learned _not_ to comment on her weight because he wisely poured water in his mug and held his tongue. "Lavinia bought tea, I see. Is it the right flavor? I can ask her to buy something else next time."

"It's good." he told her, sounding a bit uneasy.

She chose to stir the conversation away from Lavinia. Clearly, he was still uncomfortable with the idea of her having a domestic staff. Or perhaps it was the mention of breakfast being a regular occurrence that was spooking him.

"Should I expect you to regularly feed me?" she cheerfully teased, taking her stool back.

He settled down on the other side of the counter, with his back to the living-room. That too didn't sit well with him, she noticed. He kept his back straight when he was usually happy to slouch and she could tell he didn't like having a large open space right behind him.

"Depends what you want me to feed you… You look good with stuff in your mouth." he retorted, the innuendo so obvious she half choked on her coffee.

"Crass." she declared.

It made him chuckle as he dug in his eggs. "You asked."

The eggs weren't the best she had ever eaten but they were good and it meant more that he had been the one to cook them. He could have asked Lavinia to whip him something up – any of her other lovers _would_ have.

"You were getting upset again." he said suddenly, a bit out of the blue. "In the shower. Could feel it."

She knew he had no control over it any more than she could help herself from feeling the echo of his worry right then but it still irritated her to be an open book like that. Were there ways to… _close_ the bond? Would she want to if there were? It was so special… And being connected to him, having that certainty that whatever happened, he was made for her, a part of her, was too precious to be discarded but…

She had remained silent too long and his worry increased one notch.

"You're sure it ain't…" he hesitated and then made a face. "Look, sweetheart, the stuff I said last night, I get it was heavy. And you shouldn't have to feel that _fucking_ pain so… I'd get it if it's too much on top of the drinking and… _Everything_." He gulped down some tea, his hands were shaking a little. "We met two days ago. It's all going very fast and…"

"Too fast for you?" she cut him off. She was curious about that. She felt like a part of him was dragging its feet into the relationship. She didn't know if he was scared of commitment or if it was the fact they were so different or…

He studied her for a long moment and then dipped his head. "Maybe."

Her heart started racing in her chest. Her own fingers were trembling now and she clutched her cup of coffee harder. It was one thing to lose _The Escort,_ it was entirely another to…

"Don't." he scowled, immediately reaching out to grab one of her hands. _Don't what?_ , she wanted to ask, _don't panic? Too late for that._ "Yeah, it's going fast and this whole soulmate thing… But, _fuck_ , Effie, I can't go back to before… I…"

 _I couldn't live without you anymore_.

She didn't hear the words but she felt them. Like a caress against her heart.

"Me neither." she whispered, entwining their fingers. She stared at their linked hands and licked her lips. "I am not upset about you, Haymitch. In fact… In fact, I think meeting you happened at just the right time. I just… I have work related things going on."

"So you said." He frowned. "But…"

"I do not want to talk about it." she said quickly. Talking about it to someone who wasn't Seneca would make it real, it would be acknowledging the possibility that she might be back to running from casting to casting trying to appeal to people who would always lean toward the younger models very soon. It would make her think, again that using him for her own publicity gain was an option and she didn't want to tempt herself with the possibility. Not after what he had confessed the previous night.

He tilted his head slightly to the left, stared at her. "You're so upset about it… Nobody's bothering you, yeah? Cause the things you hear on the news lately… Anyone tries to touch you, I'm killing them."

And he meant it.

He meant it deep, deep down.

And _that_ should have frightened her. And yet it didn't. If she could have found the person who was responsible for his injury… She might not have been merciful either.

"I am not helpless." she chided him because she didn't like the thought of him thinking she couldn't take care of herself. "But it is nothing of that nature. And it is not something you should be concerned about however upset it makes me feel. All will be well in the end. I am just fretting over nothing." She waved the topic off with her free hand. "Let's talk about something else. How about we keep playing the questions game? I never got to ask… Do you have any family close by or are they still living in Virginia?"

He immediately dropped his gaze to his cup of tea and took his hand away from hers and she knew she had put her foot in her mouth. She would have known even without the sudden burst of sadness she felt through their connection.

"I'm alone." he answered, his voice sharp and a little angry.

She should have known better. The previous day when she had asked him where he was from, she had sensed the topic would have been better left alone.

She regretted not thinking before speaking now.

"Not anymore." she whispered before she could second-guess.

His grey eyes slowly traveled back up and met hers. It never failed to amazed her how many nuances there could be to a color as plain as grey. It might become her favorite color yet.

"Guess not." he offered, visibly making an effort to curb his tone. "What about you? You got any brother or sister?"

"A sister." she confirmed. "Older." And far more beautiful than she was, already married to a wealthy husband with the two perfect required children – as her mother never failed to remind her. "She lives in the city but we do not see each other a lot. We are not close. We are… very different."

Haymitch frowned as if it didn't make much sense to him. The question was on her lips but she swallowed it back. She wanted to ask if he had any siblings – had _had_ any siblings perhaps – but she sensed it wouldn't help. _He_ must have sensed her curiosity because he looked strangely resolute, as if waiting for her question.

"What are your plans today?" she deflected, taking a couple of forkfuls of her eggs. They _were_ good. A little overcooked perhaps but it had been a long time since she had allowed herself proper breakfast food so she didn't even quite remember what they were supposed to taste like.

"Nothing much." he answered, sounding a little relieved they were done exploring the family stuff. "Need to get in touch with Chaff, I guess. I've been off grid for long enough he's gonna start to worry."

A small smile touched her lips. "See? You are not as alone as you claim. When do I get to meet Chaff?"

"Already did. He was at the speed soulmate finding thing." he grumbled.

A pang of unease made her look back down. Perhaps he didn't want her to meet his friends, to take a spot in his real life – the life he led when he wasn't in her penthouse being her soulmate and having sex with her.

She hesitated and then plastered a bright smile on her lips, making sure her tone was cheerful as she rose up to get herself another cup of coffee. "I meant _properly."_

His arms sneaked around her waist while she watched her cup quickly filling up with dark bitter liquid. His nose bumped against her neck and she dropped her head back, already feeling better. She always felt better when he was holding her and she thought it wasn't quite fair.

"What are you fretting about now?" he muttered in her shoulder.

"We _truly_ need to start talking boundaries." she replied.

He snorted. "As if you ain't poking at that bond every two seconds."

She might have been. Enough to know he was a little amused but mostly apprehensive. She was also polite enough to _not_ comment on her findings. But if he wanted to play it that way…

"What are you anxious about, then?" she challenged.

He let out a long deep breath and shrugged, letting his arms fall from around her, with a detachment that seemed terribly fake – and that _was_. "Honestly, take your pick, sweetheart."

One of his hands disappeared in his pocket, the other started drumming an uneven rhythm on the counter…

"Oh." She felt stupid and she was even more hesitant when she reached for his arm. "Do you… Do you want a drink?"

She made a mental note to ask Lavinia to dispose of all the liquor in the penthouse, her cherished wine included. She could do that for her soulmate. If it would help.

"I _always_ want a drink." he scorned, escaping her touch by going back to sit in front of his plate. He piled what was left of his eggs in his mouth in the most disgusting way but she kept her peace about it. She had a feeling he was just trying to reel her up, perhaps so she would kick him out the door and he would be free to use that as an excuse to drink… "Stop doing that." he growled.

She blinked and frowned. "Doing what?"

He rolled his eyes. "Reading my feelings." He waved his hand in the air in a vague gesture. "You've got that look on your face."

Hadn't she _just_ accused him of doing the same?

She sat down and cradled her new cup of coffee between her hands. "Do you want to look into ways of… blocking the bond? It must exist."

He froze. He wasn't looking at her and when he talked, his voice was cold. "You want to break it?"

"No!" she exclaimed, immediately grabbing his arm over the counter. For a second she thought he would recoil and flee her touch again but this time he kept very still, even going as far as gripping her own wrist. The thought of being parted from him was still distressing, the idea that this connection between them might disappear… She would be so lonely, so uneven, so… _Incomplete. Broken_. _Alone_.

Tears filled her eyes at the very possibility and he looked equally hurt and distraught.

She stood up, walked around the counter and climbed on his lap, forcing him to grab the counter to keep his balance and avoid them plummeting to the floor. She wrapped her arms around his neck, tried to snuggle as close to his bare chest as she could… It helped that he was bare-chested, it helped to feel the warmth of his tanned skin, it helped to be able to slid her hand down and touch his soulmate words… _Her_ words on his skin. _Her_ mark. _Hers_.

His hand sneaked between her legs but there was no easy reaching her words and she felt sorry he couldn't touch them as much as he wanted to. There was comfort in touching those words as terrible as they were.

"I am sorry, I did _not_ mean it like that." she whispered in his neck. "Do not leave me. _Ever_."

He dropped his head against hers, letting out a long tired breath.

"It's been just over a day." he said in a quiet, forcibly calm voice. "And this soulmate stuff, it's huge and annoying." She bristled because she wouldn't have called it _annoying_ – if he found the soulmate stuff annoying, did it mean he found _her_ annoying by extension? His hand left her leg to coil around her nape. He squeezed and she immediately relaxed. It was the first time he had done that but she found she liked it and she hoped he would do it again. It felt comforting and possessive all at once. He must have felt an echo of the whole thing because he only spoke again once the tension had left her. "We're gonna adjust, sweetheart. It's _just_ been two nights. A day. It's still new."

She sniffed. "It feels like forever to me."

"Yeah…" he sighed. "But it _ain't_. You get what I'm saying, yeah?"

They didn't know each other yet, not really. They had intimate knowledge of the other mind, thanks to the bond but where everything else was concerned they were virtual strangers. They needed time. Time to make room in each other's life for the other. Time to… adjust to the fact they were now forever linked through something that was a deep invasion of privacy. Time to learn how to function, not only as soulmate but as a couple.

They had jumped straight into a serious relationship without any of the build-up steps.

At least the sex was great.

And the sex always made them feel better every time they panicked about the soulmate thing. It was with that in mind that she angled her head up for a kiss. Haymitch's lips were already there, either because he had sensed her intent or because he had the same idea. The kiss was brutal, a little dirty, and she had to remind herself Lavinia was somewhere in the penthouse and they couldn't just… Do it right there.

But knowing that and articulating it when Haymitch's hands were fondling her ass were two very different things and, all in all, it might have been a good thing that the elevator chimed at that moment.

Saved by the bell…


	10. Chapter 10

Effie's brain registered the elevator's chime and she managed to slid off Haymitch's lap before Brutus strolled into the room, his heavy sport bag tossed over his shoulder.

The whole thing, she guessed, still looked damning. Haymitch's left hand was still on the back of her thigh if nothing else and she must have looked disheveled.

Brutus' eyebrows shot up when he spotted the stranger bare-chested in the kitchen and his lips stretched into an amused smile.

 _Haymitch_ , on the other hand,wasn't amused at all.

The moment he saw Brutus, he stood up, angling his body so it was slightly in front of hers – _shielding_ her, her mind supplied a second before irritation kicked in – and he stared at him so rudely that Effie wanted to whack his shoulder. She had never had violent urges before she had met him and she briefly wondered if he was rubbing on her the wrong way.

Under Haymitch's intense scrutiny, Brutus tensed, his amusement quickly fading into a dangerous sort of calm, quite similar to Haymitch's own demeanor. The two men assessed each other, clearly trying to evaluate the threat.

Effie rolled her eyes at all this macho posturing and slipped from behind Haymitch to reach for the clutch she had discarded the previous night and Lavinia had yet to place back in her walk-in closet. She grabbed her phone and unlocked it, tossing both men an annoyed look. She had a couple of messages but nothing that seemed urgent. "When you are done deciding which one of you is the most manly, I will make the proper introductions."

Brutus burst out laughing and Haymitch immediately relaxed, probably because as frightening as Brutus could look sometimes – he _was_ built like a gorilla – he really was a teddy bear underneath and it showed.

"Ex-military?" Haymitch asked with a touch of… _something_ in his tone.

Brutus immediately straightened up as if he was standing at attention. "Yes, sir." Effie lifted a surprised eyebrow because she had never heard Brutus call anyone _sir,_ not even Seneca – who she knew to be one of his customers – and certainly not with that degree of instant respect. Haymitch didn't seem fazed by it, not even when Brutus flashed him a big grin. " _Semper Fi_."

Effie crossed her arms and watched, confused for a second until she remembered that the Latin phrase was supposed to be the Marines' motto. Or something similar. She didn't claim to be an expert in their military.

" _De Oppresso Liber."_ Haymitch replied as if it was a code, his voice dripping with bitter irony.

Brutus let out an impressed whistle, his clear eyes darting to the scar on Haymitch's side and back up to his face. "Green beret?"

What an outrageous choice of hat wear, she mused, still watching as Haymitch winced.

"Yeah." he nodded, finally outstretching a hand. "Retired."

Brutus glanced at the heavy relatively fresh scar tissues on Haymitch's stomach again – and, at the way Haymitch looked around, she knew he was looking for his shirt and she _almost_ fetched it for him – but politely didn't make the obvious connection out loud. He shook Haymitch's hand.

"I did two tours. Made it to First Lieutenant and quitted." Brutus explained. "I'm a private trainer now. It pays better."

"Haymitch." he offered in return.

He didn't give a rank, Effie noticed, not that it seemed to matter because just at the way he stood and at the way Brutus automatically seemed to defer, it seemed the two men had silently established between themselves that Haymitch was the highest ranking officer in the room.

She hadn't thought to ask and now she was a little curious about that.

She was also a little turned on by it.

"Are you joining us today?" Brutus asked, clearly excited by the prospect. He finally turned to acknowledge Effie's presence. She tilted her head to the side, not quite pleased with his lapse in manners given the huge paycheck she signed at the end of every week.

Haymitch made a strangled noise that might have meant no but Effie hadn't liked being ignored while they played soldiers and she didn't like the thought of Haymitch leaving just yet either. "Why not?"

"I ain't really…" Haymitch winced, his hand automatically reaching for his wounded side…

"We can tailor the exercises to your needs." Brutus cut him off, in the professional tone Effie usually liked so much. She paid him to shout at her like a sergeant instructor so she wouldn't slack and keep exercising but she also appreciated it when he took the time to explain what the exercises were for and gave her a pep talk when she was so exhausted she didn't think she could do more. Brutus had been a great help after the sleeping pills problem and he was trustworthy, which was why she didn't mind him seeing Haymitch.

Every objection Haymitch raised was swiped away. Brutus had a spare pair of sweatpants in his duffle bag and sneakers that would probably fit and would not take no for an answer.

Effie let it happen despite her soulmates' increasingly desperate glances. She figured if he really wanted to go, Haymitch would go and if he really didn't want to exercise, he would simply _not_ do it. She had never pegged him as someone who could be bullied into something.

His apprehension, mostly, seemed to have to do with his injury. Brutus asked questions about it in a professional tone on their way over to the room she had converted into a gym of sort – and she didn't miss Haymitch's incredulous look when he stepped inside, she supposed he thought it to be another eccentricity of hers – and by the time they were ready to start, Effie knew more about the wound than she had five minutes earlier. Not about the circumstances. He had told her as much about the circumstances as he could.

 _Can tell you guts are fucking slippery and disgusting and I ran like hell to jump off a fucking cliff and into a fucking chopper thinking I was gonna drop them and trip on my own fucking entrails and die there and it would be the most fucking stupid death of all time._

What she learned was how many surgeries he had gone through, how long it had taken for him to be up and about again and how his doctor had encouraged him to find a physical activity but he hadn't bothered. Brutus was easy to talk to and knew how to ask questions without judging – hell, the number of times he had been forced to ask her how she felt during her withdrawals from sleeping pills alone; he had pushed her to the point of throwing up sometimes.

"I need pictures before we start." she cut in when she sensed Brutus shift into drill instructor mode. She didn't want him to bark instructions just yet.

"Oh, yes. Sure." he said. "With me or…"

"One with you and then you can take a few while I pretend to work out." she decided.

Haymitch watched, arms crossed and leaning against the wall, as she and Brutus took selfies and went over the well-rehearsed routine of making it look like she had been working on different machines and exercises. She would post them as a story later.

Brutus must have caught Haymitch's slightly judgmental look because he shrugged. "Makes good publicity. She tags me, I get new customers."

At the lost look on his face, she guessed Haymitch had no idea what a tag was. She cut in before he could say something rude. "Let's start."

Brutus had her and Haymitch go through different exercises. Haymitch's, she couldn't help but notice, were lighter and spared his middle section as much as possible. Brutus shouted at them to be quicker, to go higher or deeper, to push themselves… A session usually lasted an hour and a half. After only forty minutes, Haymitch collapsed on his back, completely out of breath, clearly wiped and pressing a hand against his side.

Effie immediately stopped the core building exercise and intended to rush over but Brutus waved her off and yelled at her to keep going.

His voice softened to something far more natural when he towered over Haymitch's sprawled form though. "Not bad for a first day, sir."

"Ain't ever doing that again…" Haymitch grumbled.

"Sure, you are." Brutus countered. Effie watched, keeping her breathing regular and ignoring the throbbing pain in her own limbs, as her coach grabbed Haymitch's ankle and forced his leg toward his chest. He had done it for Effie a few times when she couldn't move anymore, it was meant to stretch the muscles. "You join us again, we're gonna have you back in shape in no time." He seemed to realize though that this was up to Effie more than Haymitch and that he was intruding on private matters because he amended. "Hell, even if you don't… Give me a call I'll give you a good discount. Us vets have to stick together, right?" Haymitch seemed to have more than a chosen words for that last comment but one look at Effie and he forcefully held his tongue. "Keep stretching."

Brutus kept an eye on him while he finished stretching all the while screaming at her that she was slacking today. She was only able to focus once Haymitch had left to limp to her bedroom for a shower though.

The rest of the session was _hell,_ as it always was but it also made her feel good because she knew her figure would look great the next week on the catwalk.

"Please, do not tell Seneca about Haymitch." she warned Brutus in a low voice when she walked him back to the elevator. "He does not know I met someone yet and I like it better that way."

Brutus nodded with a small frown, as if a little offended she thought he would gossip about her. He knew about the importance of keeping certain things secret, though. He was going out with one of her model friends and Valeria liked to keep her private life close to her chest. They hadn't gone public yet either.

He hesitated a second before stepping in the elevator and then turned back, making a face. "Not my place to say and he seems like a good guy… But green berets mean special ops. And the guys in special ops… They're not the best adjusted people. Be careful."

The warning might have been appreciated because it was heartfelt if Haymitch hadn't been so insecure about his own mental stability. Was this what he had to compose with? Were people always reacting that way because he had been part of whatever classified stuff it was special ops were doing? She didn't imagine the prejudice would be helping his self-worth.

"Haymitch is not dangerous." she growled, glancing over her shoulder to make sure he wasn't about to overhear a conversation that could be misinterpreted.

Brutus lifted both hands in a defensive gesture. "The injury's bad. I mean _really_ bad. Whatever happened, it can't have been pretty. It's bound to have left… _issues_. PTSD's a serious thing, Effie, that's all I'm saying."

She pursed her lips and watched him go, not quite pleased with him for _assuming_. With her luck, she _fully_ expected Haymitch to be lurking nearby but she found him still in the shower, propped against the wall, letting the water stream down on him.

"Are you alright?" she asked, slightly worried. She wasn't getting anything through the bond but that didn't mean…

"Fine." He snorted. "So... That wasn't pathetic at all."

She supposed he meant how quickly he had been forced to give up. She slipped the drenched sport bra over her head and got rid of her pants and underwear before joining him inside the stall. His arms immediately wrapped around her.

"You will get your strength back." she promised, dropping a kiss over his heart.

"I ain't really the kind of person who exercises." he admitted.

"Some exercise is healthy." she argued. "Perhaps you could join me for a session or two a week. It might help with your recovery. Isn't that what your doctor recommended?"

That was what he had told Brutus.

He sighed and knocked his head against the wall once. "He ain't a bad trainer."

"He is the best on the market right now." she commented, dropping another kiss closer to his neck. "Are you _very_ tired?"

"Is your housekeeper still around?" he countered, letting his left hand drop to her ass.

"She is not going to barge in the shower, Haymitch." She nibbled on his neck, traced a burning path from his hip to his groin with her fingertip…

He shook his head. "Can't lift you up."

"Well, I will simply have to do all the work then…" she teased.

When she fell to her knees in front of him, she thought his eyes would pop right out of his head. She hid her smile in his inner thigh, kissing and nibbling in turn…

She made a show for him.

Men always liked a good show when women did this.

"You're so perfect…" he muttered, reaching for her hair. He couldn't find a good grip because they were braided so he settled for placing his hand at the back of her head, nudging her closer. "So _fucking_ perfect…"

She beamed at the endearment. _Perfect_ was what she had strived for all her life.

It didn't take long for him to come, she hadn't expected it would. She wasn't sure how she ended up pinned against the shower wall with his hand between her legs. She didn't think she could come on _fingers_ right then, she needed more, but his own desire, the peaceful feeling of his afterglow, were saturating the bond and, all in all, it was enough to make her reach orgasm.

She slumped against him and he wrapped his arms around her again, holding her up, gently stroking the back of her nape.

She let out a round of exhausted chuckles. "You know… I read somewhere that sex was addictive. The more you have it, the more you want it."

"And we're both addicts." he reminded her, not sounding particularly concerned. Probably because it wasn't an addiction he minded.

"I have been having more sex since we met than in the last six months." she confessed, rubbing her nose against his shoulder, dropping a kiss against a bite mark she must have left at some point.

He snorted. "Yeah, well… You're the first I had in over a year so… I've got you beaten here, sweetheart." _Over a year_?, she wanted to exclaim but she contained it because she didn't want him to think she was mocking him. He must have sensed her surprise anyway because he snorted again. "Long deployment. Then, the medical stuff…"

She drew her head back so she could watch him. His grey eyes were guarded but not quite hostile.

What she wanted to do was drag him back into her bed and keep him there by any mean necessary just so he wouldn't go and get himself in dangerous situations again. Just so he wouldn't get _hurt_ again. Just so she could keep on making him groan her name with absolute worship.

His lips stretched into a smirk, either because it was written plainly on her face or because the bond had betrayed her yet again. The amusement slowly faded and he turned a little more serious. "You want me to look into ways of controlling that _fucking_ soulmate thing while you do your work thing today?"

The mix of feelings she got through the ' _fucking_ soulmate thing' told her he was both reluctant and intrigued at the possibility of, at least, dulling the bond so it wouldn't be so… _sharp_.

"It settled only last night…" she tempered. Perhaps she had been hasty earlier, simply irritated by the fact she couldn't hide anything from him. Some honesty wasn't that bad, surely? She simply wasn't used to… She licked her lips and dropped her gaze, staring at his Adam's apple. "I do not like being an open book." she admitted. "It is not that I am particularly deceitful but…"

"You like your privacy." He shrugged. "Can't say I like you poking in my head either."

"I am _not_ poking in your head." she huffed with a pout and then amended. "I am not poking _on purpose_. And you… How am I supposed to please you, to be what you want if you can tell every time I have to adjust my behavior or pretend to like something or…"

His hand carefully cradled her chin and tilted her head up. The pad of his thumb ran across her bottom lip. "I want _you_. Don't want you _adjusting_ anything or pretending to like anything." He frowned but strengthened his grip a little when she tried to avert her eyes. "Who put that sort of _shit_ in your head, princess? _Hell_ , I like when you please me…" He flashed her a leering smile. "Doesn't mean I need you to force yourself to do it or whatever _shit_ you're thinking you've gotta do."

She pursed her lips, staring at his nose rather than his eyes. "Men get bored and then men cheat. We have to keep them interested."

His frown deepened. His thumb gently ran along her jaw. "Says who?" She didn't answer. She wasn't even sure anymore. Her mother? _Cosmo_? Every TV show, movie and book under the sun? She had been raised thinking like that, that if she wanted to keep a man, she needed to be the most beautiful, the sexiest, the most perfect and all the while maintaining a lady's behavior in public. She needed to be the perfect slut in his bed and the perfect wife on his arm. Haymitch let out a small sigh. " _Shitty_ relationships you had. _Fuck_ if that photographer guy didn't make a number on you…"

She felt a flash of simmering wrath through the bond but he didn't let it show on his face.

"Stelan did not do anything wrong." she argued but her voice sounded slightly feeble.

"Except seduce a teenager." he retorted, planting a kiss on her forehead.

"I was willing." she insisted. Nobody had ever found anything to say about that particular relationship – except her mother when they had officially broken off because Stelan had still been more famous than her at that point and too wealthy not to be a suitable potential husband. Nobody had ever hinted it was _wrong_ and she didn't understand why Haymitch was so hung up on it. Fashion was a different world, normal rules didn't apply. People hook up, some of those people were sometimes young… Why, it wasn't just _fashion_. She had been born and raised in a world of beauty pageants and in beauty pageants it wasn't unusual to play the seduction card with judges no matter your age – or _their_ ages. It was something she had applied to every part of her life…

You _had_ to keep on top, you _had_ to be the one everyone wanted to sleep with… That was how you kept yourself relevant, by remaining _desired,_ by making them _want_ you.

And that had never been as true as it was right then, when she was at risk of losing her contract because people didn't desire her any longer.

"Don't need you pretending to want things you don't, alright?" Haymitch said firmly. "You don't do that with me." She was starting to panic a little because she wasn't certain what he wanted from her. Who would object to their significant other being willing to step out of their comfort zone to please them? Who would object to their significant other being willing to become exactly who they wanted in a romantic partner? The shower stall felt too small all of a sudden and Haymitch's embrace felt suffocating rather than comforting. He stepped back, giving her space without her having to ask. His grey eyes were still too much to be borne. "You're my soulmate, sweetheart. That's as perfect as it gets. Don't need more than you being you. We're good?"

There were other things he wanted to add, she confusedly sensed, like how he was already not worthy of her or how she deserved someone better so she really shouldn't try to make herself something else for him because he hadn't thought he would even get someone as good as her… She wasn't in any state of hearing it. She nodded and grabbed a towel from the rack, escaping the small space. "I need to get ready. I have to be at the fitting soon."

"Need a ride?" he offered. "I've got my car, I can drop you off."

For a second, she was tempted to accept, if only because the perspective of being apart was still a daunting one. But what had just been said in that shower felt important and heavy and slightly unwelcomed and she needed to process it. Because beneath it all, it felt like a negative comment on her life choices.

So she refused the offer and she simply nodded when he poked his head back in the bathroom once he was dressed and ready to go. He told her to call him, sounding perfectly detached but feeling absolutely uncertain – she knew because she felt his uncertainty down to her bones – and she said she would see him later even though they hadn't made any real plans.

She wasn't sure she wanted to make any, right then.

* * *

 _Did you like it? Do you think they will make up quickly? Are you still interested in this story? Let me know!_


	11. Chapter 11

The anxiety, as soon as Haymitch had left the penthouse without even a peck on her lips, rose up to the point Effie could barely breathe. She didn't know if it was his or hers or a mix of both.

It didn't abate once she was driving her car to Portia's workshop and it didn't stop when she stepped out of the car and spotted a paparazzi who took she wasn't sure how many pictures of her. She forced a smile but pushed her sunglasses on her nose. At least, she was dressed adequately in a darling baby blue and light pink skirt and top under her open fur coat.

It was warm inside the workshop and it was buzzing with the frantic energy that always invaded places like that soon before a show. Portia's assistant led her to the backroom where a few models were already standing on small platforms so the seamstresses could adjust the dresses and various outfits to their specs. Effie waved at a few people from afar, verbally greeted some other, smiled through the whole thing even though it was almost painful…

Haymitch's dark mood was like a cloud twisting and turning in her chest, raining on her parade. No matter how much she tried to ignore it, it bothered her.

Portia's assistant directed her to the back of the workshop that had momentarily been turned into a dressing room, there another seamstress guided her to a marvel of an immaculate white amount of lacy fabric. They hadn't discussed Effie wearing the bridal outfit – to be honest, Effie had _assumed_ she would be wearing the bridal outfit because it was always a fashion show's closing number and that was usually given to the star model – but now that she saw it…

She reverently brushed her fingertips against the lace and didn't lose any time in shedding her own clothes to slip it on, helped by her assigned seamstress. She knew Gladys from previous shows, the woman was chatty and Effie did her best to answer in kind but once she had the wedding dress on, all she could do was stare at herself in the mirror that ran up to the ceiling a short distance away.

The dress was absolutely perfect.

The top was entirely made of see-through lace, thicker in some places and shaped like white butterflies that kept everything decent. The butterfly motif was embroidered everywhere on the bottom part of the dress but it wasn't see-through, it was delicate layers of organza with discrete supple metal sticks that gave it the shape of a bell or a tulip. It was short in front and long in the back with a good length of a trail…

She fell in love with the dress at first sight and barely heard any of Gladys' remarks about how it needed little alterations to fit her. She barely felt it when needles were pinned up here and there to make it more fitting to her figure.

"Here you are!" Portia suddenly appeared with a beaming smile, her hair trapped in a careless bun at the top of her head, wearing a shimmering red jumpsuit that somehow both looked casual and expensive. "Thank you, Gladys, I will do Effie myself."

Effie bent down to exchange air kisses with her friend, careful not to disrupt the needles.

"This is your best work." she immediately declared, running her hand on her lace covered stomach.

"I thought you would like it." Portia grinned. "I also thought you might _need_ it eventually." Effie licked her lips and glanced around to make sure nobody was close enough to eavesdrop even though the crowded noisy workshop guaranteed some privacy. Portia wasn't deterred by her lack of answer, she pinned the fabric a little tighter on the back of the dress, wriggling her eyebrows. "So? I haven't heard from you yesterday. How is it going?"

How _was_ it going?

Wonderfully? Terribly?

She couldn't even say. One second it was perfect, like last night when she had realized just how much Haymitch wanted her, and the next it was a pit of anxiety, like right then. It was burning hot one moment and freezing cold the next.

She bit down on her bottom lip and found herself battling ridiculous tears.

Portia frowned, alarmed. "What's wrong, darling? Did he hurt you?"

"Of course, he did not _hurt_ me!" she snapped, annoyed that everyone assumed Haymitch would end up hurting her – him included.

Portia recoiled a little and lifted a pacifying hand that glittered with a lot of shiny rings, her frown only increased. "I am sorry for asking. It is just… Your soulmate words… And you always said…"

"I know what I always said." she cut her off, clenching her jaw. She had never wanted to find her soulmate, never wanted to know why they would be so rude as to compare her to a clown first thing, never wanted to find out if… "He is… He is just so…"

She fought to keep her composure before she had a complete breakdown in a room full of other models, seamstresses and the occasional assistant running around. She felt _exhausted_ all of a sudden, as if the manic energy that usually kept her going at all time had simply run out. She regretted not more actively trying to sleep the previous night, she regretted the last round of sex in the shower and she even regretted eating the stupid eggs because now they were churning in her stomach.

"Let's go to my office." Portia suggested, sounding a little alarmed.

Effie made to step down from the small platform without protest and then remembered the dress she was wearing and stared at it with confused eyes. She couldn't _keep_ it on. She would end up staining it or damaging it or… Portia's hands guided her firmly back to the dressing-room and then undid the delicate row of pearl buttons that lined the spine. Then, she helped Effie back in her own clothes and steered her toward the office part of the workshop by cradling her elbow. On the way, she exchanged a few words with her main assistant, flashed a bright smile and waved to someone at the other end of the workshop and, finally, she closed the door to her private office and Effie collapsed on one of the leather armchairs and buried her face in her hands.

Portia's office didn't really look like an office. There were comfortable armchairs and sofas, bright abstract paintings on the walls, samples of fabrics outflowing from boxes in every corner, a steel drawing desk in a corner, a few wooden mannequins and a plushy red rug in the middle of the room… The actual desk and its computer had been pushed in one corner to make room for two bean bags.

How the stylist could sit on those while salvaging her dignity had always been a mystery to Effie but, surely enough, that was where Portia chose to sit after dragging it closer to the armchair Effie had picked for herself. Then she forced her hands away from her face and schooled her features in a serious expression.

"Tell me what's wrong." Portia ordered.

She didn't know where to start.

But the worst right then…

"I can _feel_ him missing me and it's _killing_ me." she whispered, pressing a hand against her chest, blinking hard against the tears.

Portia didn't look particularly surprised by that. "Why didn't you bring him? I _was_ expecting you to bring him…"

"This is a work thing." she argued and it sounded feeble to her ears. She would have brought Haymitch to the red carpet the previous day if he had let her. She would have brought him _everywhere_ if he had let her. There was the press to consider if they wanted to keep a low profile, of course, but… She could have passed him off as a new bodyguard or something…

"I would not have minded." Portia clucked her tongue, twisted around on the bean bag to reach a box of kleenex on her desk and handed it to Effie who gratefully took one and dabbed under her eyes, mindful of her make-up. "I would not part from Cinna right now. He's out there right now, you know. I wanted to introduce you but… It will wait. He's a stylist too, didn't I tell you? Well, he is a costume designers who is far too obsessed with fire special effects but he knows his way around a needle so I put him to work."

Effie could tell Portia tried to curb it for her sake but her voice radiated complete happiness.

It only made her feel more bitter. Wasn't it supposed to be like that when you found your soulmate? All sunshine and rainbow and utter bliss? The thing with Haymitch felt more like a rollercoaster.

There was a knock on the door that saved her from having to say anything. Portia rose to answer and turned back with the tray her assistant handed her. She placed it on the floor between them – which would have shocked Effie's mother so much and horrified even _Effie_ a little – and poured two cups of tea from the steaming teapot.

Effie took a deep breath through her nose and let it out through her mouth, trying to calm herself, to see through the cloud of emotions battling in her chest. She couldn't tell whose feelings she found so overwhelming. Haymitch's or her own? The anxiety was almost mind numbing but she wasn't certain it all belonged to him. She was anxious too. And the worry… The worry was his. But she was worried too. The sadness now… The sadness didn't belong to her. And the guilt… What was he feeling guilty about? The conversation in the shower?

"I hate the soulmate bond." Effie declared once Portia had handed her the cup. "It is like… It is like a leash around my neck! I hate it! I _hate_ it!"

Portia seemed a little taken aback by the strength of her dislike and Effie felt like a child who had just made a tantrum.

"I do not find it so bad…" her friend answered carefully. "We _are_ a little anxious to part for too long… That's why Cinna insisted he would help today but other than that…"

Effie scoffed. "How can you bear to feel what he is feeling all the time? It is… It is _terrible_." She shook her head. "It has its moments, of course. I won't deny it makes the sex…" She waved her hand. "But he is in so much anguish, it makes me _crazy_ because I _cannot_ _help_. And, obviously, it is not a one-way street, he can tell everything I feel and how am I supposed to live like that? With someone who can tell through every little white lie?"

She stopped ranting when she realized Portia was staring with wide eyes.

"You can feel what he is feeling?" her best friend asked in a hushed whisper. "Even… Even right now?"

Effie nodded, frowning a little. "Can't you?"

Portia slowly shook her head. "We did not get that. I do not like being away from him and we do seem to have an uncanny ability to understand each other without words but we do not share feelings, no."

"Perhaps the bond did not settle for you, then." she commented. "Because when it did for us…"

"Oh, it did settle." Portia grinned. "It settled with _fireworks_. Best sex ever."

Effie rubbed the bridge of her nose and took a sip of her tea, still trying to calm herself. "I passed out when it settled."

"In the middle of sex?" her friend asked in an excited gossipy squeal.

Effie nodded. "I could feel him. All around me. _Inside_ me. His pleasure, his desire… It was…" She blushed and pressed the back of her hand against her cheek, trying to bring her temperature back down. Had it just happened the previous night? It felt like a lifetime ago. Before he had told her about his injury, before she had felt the pain… Her hand automatically drifted to the right side of her stomach and she placed the cup back down on the tray with shaky fingers. "It is too much."

"No wonder you look so tired if you spent your night having faint-worthy sex." Portia teased.

Did she look tired? Wonderful.

"He is not what I am used to." she confessed. "He is…" _True_. Not fake like all the phonies she called friends. More real than anything or anyone she had ever known. "I _hate_ that he can tell when I am pretending to make him happy. He keeps saying he wants me for me and not…" She stopped, frustrated, and shook her head again. "I do _not_ understand. Why is it bad to want to please someone? To tell them what they want to hear? To be what they want you to be?" She searched Portia's gaze but her friend was uncharacteristically silent and, in that silence, Effie felt the weight of her judgment. "What is it? Do _you_ think I should not strive to keep my partners happy too, now?"

"I think…" Portia answered carefully, pausing to take a long sip of tea that was nothing more than a way to waste time in Effie's opinion. "Effie…"

"Just say it." she snapped.

Her friend pursed her lips, probably not happy with the snarky tone but willing to overlook it. "I think that when you are _not_ in love with someone and you do not particularly care to keep them, you are acting more like yourself. You expect respect and affection, like you should." Portia winced. "Now, when you _are_ in love with someone… You have a tendency to let them treat you however they please and..."

"I want them to keep on loving me." she interrupted in a hiss. "There is nothing wrong with that. Do not make it sound so _bad_."

Portia clearly would have preferred _not_ to have this conversation but she also looked a little relieved to be allowed to say her piece and Effie couldn't help but wonder just how long she had been thinking those words, how long she had been waiting for the ideal moment to say them.

"There is nothing wrong in wanting to be loved." the stylist concurred. "It does _not_ mean you should let people treat you badly because you are desperate to keep them with you and if your Haymitch thinks the same way I do, then he cannot be that bad a man, darling."

" _Desperate_." she repeated flatly. "Is that what you think about me? That I am _desperate_?"

"Of course not." Portia denied, reaching out to place a hand on her knee. "Effie, darling, you are all upset…"

"Of course I am _upset_." she scowled. "My best friend thinks I am _desperate_ to keep someone because, clearly, I am not good enough to make them stay and my soulmate thinks I am some sort of nutcase because my first serious boyfriend was so much older than me. It _is_ probably a good thing I did not tell him about beauty pageants and what an excuse they are for old creepy men to ogle young girls or he would make me out to be some sort of sexually traumatized…"

"Effie." Portia cut her off gently. "I never said you were _not_ _good_ _enough_ to keep someone with you. You are putting words in my mouth."

"Am I, though?" she snorted. "Why shouldn't you think it? Seneca thinks it."

"What has Seneca got to do with this?" her friend asked. "On the phone, you said you were not going to tell him about Haymitch just yet… Have you changed your mind?"

She shook her head. "It is not about Haymitch."

To her credit, Portia took the change in subject in a heartbeat. "Is it about those rumors? About _The_ _Escort_?"

So there were enough rumors that even Portia had heard them. It meant they were traveling beyond the circle of modeling agencies now. And that meant…

"I cannot lose that contract." she whispered, terror and despair gnawing at her guts. "I would _die_ if I lost that contract."

Portia squeezed her knee, her voice chiding. "You would not _die_ , no. And it would not be the end of your career either. There are other contracts, other…"

" _The Escort_ is my life." Effie interrupted. "If I lose that, I will lose everything, you know it as well as I do. Please, do not lie to make me feel better, it only makes me feel worse."

Portia watched her for a while and then her face contorted with sympathy. "Is it a real possibility, then? I thought they were only rumors… You told me…"

"I do not know." she lied. "There is no smoke without fire."

"It might just be someone with malicious intent trying to hurt you." Portia suggested. "When do you sign the new contract?"

"It will be up for renewal soon." she sighed. "In the next few weeks."

Her friend nodded. "But _surely_ if they intended to replace you, they would have let you know by now. Truly, I think it will be alright. You are too stressed… We should go to a spa…"

"With your show around the corner?" Effie chuckled. "You cannot spare the time and I am being selfish taking you away from your work for so long as it is. Besides, would you drag your Cinna to a spa?"

Portia shrugged, unconcerned. "He would not mind a day of pampering, I'm sure. You could bring Haymitch. We could have a double date day."

The idea of Haymitch at a spa made her smile despite everything. "I do not think he is one for spas." She looked down at her hand, feeling the smooth nail polish on her thumb with her index. It calmed her a little. "He is… I told you he was a soldier?" Portia nodded encouragingly and Effie licked her lips. "Bad things happened to him. _Very_ bad things. He carries that with him all the time and…"

"You feel it too." Portia deduced. "Through the bond. Oh, Effie…"

"I want to help, I just do not know _how_." she sighed. "And all those feelings…" She shook her head, pressed her hand against her chest again. "Right now, he is all twisted anxiety, worry and anger and… And we did not part on the best terms this morning and… I miss him. I miss him _so_ _much_ it _scares_ me because I have known him only a day and a half but I cannot imagine _not_ being with him and it has only been two hours and surely that is _not_ normal to not be able to function without him for two hours…"

"I understand that." Portia promised, grabbing her hand. "Last night, Cinna went back to his apartment to fetch some clothes and I spent the whole time he was gone being a sobbing mess even though I _knew_ he would be back. It is just the soulmate bond, Effie, it will pass… It is still brand new for now but it will pass."

"How do you know?" she insisted, shaking her head. "You do not have the empathy thing. Perhaps _I_ am destined to always miss him when he is not with me."

Portia squeezed her fingers. "Perhaps he will convince you that he will always come back and you will stop being scared of him leaving you forever."

That sounded unlikely.

People who were supposed to love her unconditionally had a bad tendency to _not_ love her unconditionally and to leave her to the wolves. Case in point, her parents. If her _parents_ were so eager to get rid of her, why would her _soulmate_ be different?

When he had told her he didn't want her trying to please him that morning, it had felt like rejection rather than acceptance.

"It was better when we were together." she whispered, closing her eyes against the headache that was starting to develop. "The bond, the feelings… They were a little duller this morning. It felt manageable then. Right now…"

"Right now, you are edgy, he is probably just as edgy and the two of you are working yourselves up into a mess though that bond of yours." Portia commented in a reasonable voice. "You should go to him, darling."

"The fitting…" she argued faintly.

"I can fit you later." Portia dismissed. "Your wellbeing is more important to me than making sure you don't trip on one of my dresses." She paused and then winced. "Please, do _not_ trip on one of my dresses."

Effie snorted and then chuckled and then finally relaxed for the first time since Haymitch had started to talk in that shower. "You truly do not mind if I go?"

"I truly do not mind if you go." Portia confirmed with a small smile. "But I do insist on meeting him. A day at the spa is out but what about dinner?"

"We could do dinner." she agreed, standing up. "I will text you?"

She lost no time fetching her coat and her purse before walking out the door.

It was only once she was in her car that she realized she didn't know where Haymitch lived. Or even if he had gone back home at all. For all she knew he could be out and about.

She pulled her phone out of her bag, her heart beating a little faster when she read Seneca's text.

' _Don't forget to post pics from the fitting'_

She hadn't taken one picture at that fitting, he wouldn't be pleased with her. She swiped the message aside and called Haymitch. She called him three times in a row without getting an answer. It went straight to voicemail which either meant his phone was off or that he had blacklisted her.

The former seemed more likely than the later but it still left her with nowhere to go.

She fidgeted on her car seat, feeling slightly sick. She _needed_ him. She needed him to hold her and tell her that he wanted to keep her. She needed him to tell her she was perfect and gorgeous and…

He had offered to look into ways of controlling the bond. It had been her idea but it had been a stupid idea she hadn't thought through and now she was terrified sick he would find a way to sever it and that he would do it and leave her and…

Nausea washed over her and she leaned back against the headrest, closed her eyes and just… Let it roll over her. Upset as she was, it was difficult to make sense of what she felt – what was hers and what belonged to Haymitch's – but with her eyes closed, it was easier to _feel_ the bond. It wasn't a tangible thing she could hold on to but it was something real enough that she could…

She felt it like that first day…

Like a tether so tensed it seemed ready to snap.

She turned the engine on and followed it, feeling feverish and half-crazy with delirium.

* * *

 _Portia cameo attack! Poor Effie needs a hug! And possibly a chill pill ;) What did you think? Let me know your thoughts!_


	12. Chapter 12

Haymitch was feeling worse and worse by the time he arrived home.

His head was throbbing in time with the pulses of anguish that seeped through the bond. Effie's feelings felt like one of the oil leaks on the old motorcycle he had briefly owned once upon a time: sticky, irritating and impossible to figure out. She was anxious, upset, angry… All rolled into one. Or so he guessed. He couldn't really tell. He was anxious, upset and angry himself.

He didn't understand what he had said that was so wrong to trigger that kind of reaction.

He fumbled with his keys, missing the keyhole a few times before finally managing to find it. It turned out the door was unlocked when he was _very_ sure he had locked it before leaving the previous day. He lived in a nice neighborhood for New York but it wasn't a city where you could leave your doors unlocked and when you _did_ find it unlocked it usually meant you should call the police.

It had, at least, the benefit of distracting him from the soulmate matter for a moment.

He made sure to be silent when he stepped inside, his hand on the handle of the knife he kept hidden at the back of his belt, trusting his senses to tell him if someone tried to sneak up on him. It could be burglars, it could be someone from his army days trying to get even. You made enemies in the special forces.

You made friends too.

Haymitch relaxed when he spotted his best friend lounging on his couch, deeply asleep.

Rolling his eyes at his own stupidity, he went back to close the front door. He thought about grabbing a cushion and tossing it at Chaff's head but the soft noise of the door clicking shut must have been enough to wake him up because when Haymitch came back to the living-room, he found his friend sitting, rubbing his eyes with his good hand.

"Don't you have a bed in your apartment?" Haymitch mocked.

Chaff made a face, his tone grumpy like always when startled awake. "Neighbors were complaining again."

 _Night terrors_. Which probably meant screaming and a lot of furniture banging.

Haymitch let out a sympathetic grunt and shrugged off his coat. He tossed it on the frayed armchair in the corner and flopped down on it with a wince, immediately rubbing his abs. Exercising hadn't been a bad idea, all in all, and Brutus wasn't a bad trainer but between that and all the sex he had been having, there wasn't an inch of his body that didn't hurt.

"And I thought I looked bad." Chaff snorted, after letting out a long whistle. "What happened to you? You've been AWOL for almost two days. Was starting to worry."

He should have let Chaff know he was alright, he mused with a pang of guilt. He had thought about calling after leaving Effie's but his phone was dead, he had forgotten to charge it again. He always did. But he had promised he would try to remember, especially because of Chaff. They looked out for each other because no one else would.

When he was with Effie, it felt like the whole world faded away and she was the only thing that existed on Earth, like _they_ were the only thing that existed on Earth. He felt whole and complete and _good_.

When they were apart though…

His level of stress surged up and he bundled his hands into fists so Chaff wouldn't see them shake. Like always when he felt like that, he craved a glass of something strong.

"I did some sport." he finally explained.

Chaff's eyebrows shot up. "Yeah? What kind? Cause last time I saw you, you were running after a pretty blonde…"

Haymitch bumped his right fist against the armrest a few times, _debating_. He had always planned on telling Chaff about her but Chaff also knew just what he thought about the soulmate thing in the first place. He knew what his soulmate words were – just like he knew Chaff's to be _'Is that the best pick-up line you can think of?'_ – and he knew just how badly they had influenced his life.

"Don't tell me you've been with her all this time…" his best friend insisted with a strained bout of laughter. "Cause _good for you_ , brother, but I've been here feeling sorry for myself and it figures you were getting some."

Chaff's tone was unusually brisk in a way night terrors alone couldn't entirely explain. Haymitch frowned and watched him a little more attentively, noting the pinched mouth and the reddish eyes, noting also the way his shortened arm was protectively cradled on his lap.

"You're in pain." he deduced, leaning forward a little, forgetting all about Effie and his – and her – inner turmoil. Worry mixed with the bad feelings any reminder of that last op always brought up. Gnawing guilt, mind freezing fear, desperate rage to survive… "Phantom pain again?"

Chaff's jaw locked tight and he averted his eyes. He protectively placed his good hand on his stump. "It's nothing."

"Come on." Haymitch scolded, hauling himself off the armchair. "It ain't nothing. You took something?"

"Painkillers ain't doing _shit_." Chaff grumbled, dropping his head against the back of the couch with a long annoyed sigh. "Hoped to borrow some of your good stuff but there ain't a drop of liquor left in the house. Care to share about that?"

There was a cautious hopeful note to his tone that immediately made Haymitch scowl.

"I tossed it out." he muttered, heading for the cupboard under the stairs. "Don't make it a thing."

"It's _kind_ of a thing though." Chaff shouted after him.

Haymitch declined to respond and fetched the old box Chaff had come to hate. They had made it themselves – well, _Haymitch_ had made it following the instructions on forums for amputated people and Chaff had grumbled and complained through the whole process. The mirror box solution sometimes worked and sometimes didn't but it remained one of the best ways to help his best friend when he had one of those crisis.

Even if Chaff groaned as soon as Haymitch placed it on the coffee table.

It was a cardboard box of medium size with two holes and a mirror on one side. Once he had both wrists in the holes, from a certain angle, it gave the impression that Chaff still had two hands.

"The booze stuff… Does it have to do with the sudden cleaning?" Chaff tried to distract him. "Cause I thought it smelled weird in here when I came in and then I realized it just smelled _fresh_."

"Get it over with." Haymitch advised, ignoring him.

"Won't do _shit_." his friend complained. "It's one of those _fucking_ days."

He shrugged. "Humor me."

Chaff rolled his eyes but did place his limbs in the holes up to the forearms and then stared at the mirror until he could visualize his two hands. He closed his good one in a tight fist and slowly, with a deep slow breath, unclenched it. Then he stared at his two hands, the stretched out fingers, with a bitter look on his face.

"Color me _fucking_ surprised. Didn't work." his best friend spat. He took his hand and his stump back. "Maybe 'cause it _ain't real_ and I ain't _stupid enough_ to convince myself it is." He glared at the scar tissue on his left forearm and then, clearly forcing himself to reel in his temper, shook his head. "Tell me about the girl. Was she a good _fuck_? Cause, _hell_ , she looked…"

" _Shut up_." Haymitch growled before he could think it through. Just the thought of anyone thinking about Effie like that… Of course, he then had the sudden realization that thousands of guys were probably jerking off to pictures of her all around the world at that very minute and it didn't help. It fueled his anger.

He didn't need his anger fueled.

Not when he could feel Effie getting more and more upset by the second. If he had been a betting man, he would have put his money on her having a breakdown right at this moment and it killed him not to be able to help. He could reach out probably, send a text, make sure she was alright… But with what happened that morning… No, better keep his distance. He wasn't going to force his presence on her. She wanted her privacy, he wanted his privacy… Maybe it was time to pretend that _fucking_ bond didn't exist.

" _That_ good, uh?" Chaff mocked. "Knew I should have gone after her myself… She looked a bit like that model… You know the one? Boggs had a poster of her inside his locker… Heard from him, by the way. He's back in business. He's getting deployed in a couple of weeks. Got promoted."

He didn't want to think about Boggs or promotion or anything to do with that last disastrous mission. His stomach and Chaff's missing hand were enough reminders as they were and he had been talking and thinking too much about the army in the last twelve hours to keep talking about it without downing a bottle or two. There were things he couldn't face without liquor.

"Effie Trinket?" he suggested, sitting back down on his armchair.

"Yeah, that's the one." Chaff nodded appreciatively. "Nice piece of…"

"It _was_ her." he cut him off before he could say something that would make him want to punch him. "Effie _fucking_ Trinket."

Worldwide famous.

Indecently wealthy.

He shook his head as the enormity of that knowledge settled on him once more. It was easy to forget when he was with her. For all the eccentricities and the obvious money, she kept surprising him with how kind she was. Out of touch with common people, certainly, but kind.

"You slept with _Effie_ _Trinket_?" Chaff let out an impressed whistle and then leaned forward, his pain apparently forgotten. "You _did_ sleep with her, yeah? Cause I swear if you managed to _fuck_ that up when you could have…"

Haymitch grabbed the armrests tight, staring at the mirror box, wishing there was one big enough to help him pretend he was still whole.

"She's my soulmate."

The words seemed to echo strangely in his unusually clean living-room.

His soulmate.

 _His_.

There was a tearing sensation of some kind in his stomach and, for a second, he thought he was growing physically sick with anxiety but then he realized it was just Effie. Whatever she was doing, she was making herself sick with heartache over… Over what? He wasn't even sure. They had been fine before that shower. Sure, breakfast had been a little tense and, yeah, maybe they _should_ find a way to control the bond even though the mere idea of somehow damaging it terrified him but…

He had simply said he wanted her just as she was.

What was so wrong about that?

There was plenty wrong about _him_. But her? She was perfect. Annoying and spoiled and arrogant, sure, but perfect all the same. Tailored right for him. Witty enough to keep him on his toes, irritating enough that he wanted to kill her but endearing enough that he also wanted to protect her until his dying breath, so beautiful it was almost a joke, she was funny too, loving, soothing, and so very good at…

"You're _shitting_ me." Chaff was gaping, bringing him back to the present.

"I wish." Haymitch sighed, rubbing his eyes. "That's why she ran."

His best friend stared at him for a long, _long_ time, saying nothing. "She said her words first?"

Haymitch's soulmate words had always been a bit taboo and Chaff's tone was cautious, as if he expected him to get angry.

Haymitch wasn't angry. Not about that at least.

He found himself reaching for the familiar spot on his right side, the spot she liked to cover with her hand, and his lips stretched a little. " _Nah_. She retaliated because mine weren't any nicer."

Chaff's eyebrows shot up but he didn't look very surprised altogether. "What did you say?"

"Might have called her a clown's name." he winced. "She wears too much make-up." He said it with fondness and no bite but he still felt a flush of guilt. "She's… She's _fucking_ great."

The admission cost him.

"Yeah, I believe you." Chaff snorted. "She's _bloody_ gorgeous." His friend's dark eyes gave him a once over, his lips turning into a mocking leer. "So all that exercising you were talking about…"

"Don't." Haymitch said firmly. He wasn't going to talk to him about that. He did sometimes. _Most_ times. All in good fun. But that was with women he would never see again. Effie… Effie was different. Effie was hopefully there to stay. "And no. I really did some exercising." He rolled his eyes. "She has this personal trainer… I was roped into it."

"But you slept with her, yeah?" Chaff insisted.

" _Fuck_ , you're like a dog with a bone." Haymitch snapped, bolting to his feet to angrily stalk to the window. The glass hadn't gone through his cleaning spree and it looked tainted and dirty. Still, it was enough to see the street outside. Less busy than in the city center but still busy enough. He longed for open spaces, clear sky and a backyard so big he wouldn't be able to see the neighbor's house. "Yeah, I slept with her. Here. Happy?"

"You tell me." his friend taunted. "How was it?"

A thousand gibes came up to his lips but in the end only the truth came out. "Earth shattering."

He completely expected Chaff to make fun of him but his best friend remained silent and Haymitch didn't dare glance behind him to see the expression on his face.

"You like the girl." Chaff finally observed.

He wasn't really comfortable admitting that much. _Like_ was a little too close to _love_. And he wasn't even really sure where _he_ was standing on that front. If you had asked him two days earlier, he would have said his heart was too damaged to be able to love. Now though… Now he was wondering because…

"Enough to get rid of the booze." he muttered.

Again, Chaff was silent for a while, clearly trying to temper his words. "You're gonna manage?"

Haymitch's jaw clenched. "Guess we're gonna see. Ain't doing too bad so far."

But his tendency to fall back on the bottle usually happened when he was upset or had demons to battle. Right then, he might have been upset but he was also exhausted by two nights of awesome faint-worthy sex.

He didn't expect it to be _that_ easy all the time.

"You don't have to do it alone, you know." Chaff offered. "There are…"

"I ain't going to rehab or to see another head doctor." he cut him off.

He had seen enough shrinks when he had been stuck in his hospital bed to last a lifetime. Not that they had tried too hard. Special Ops people were screwed up. Everybody knew it. Even the shrinks.

"Not what I meant." Chaff sighed. "You could come with me to the support group. There are meetings twice a week…"

"Yeah, right." he scoffed. "No offense, buddy, but the last thing I want is to sit in a room full of vets with terrible stories."

Chaff shook his head. "It's not that kind of group. It's… It's a grief support group. For people who are mourning something or someone. Like my hand. There's a kid with a missing leg. Nice kid. There's Annie too. I told you that's where I met her."

Haymitch frowned and turned around to look at his friend. They had met Finnick through his pretty soulmate and they had immediately hit it off but when Chaff had originally explained that he had met Annie at a support group session he had imagined bumping into her in the lobby or something like that.

"It's a really nice group of people." Chaff continued, staring at the scratched coffee table. "Different stories, different backgrounds, different problems. But it's a good place to talk and unpack stuff."

He knew Chaff found the support group extremely useful and he also knew he had gotten attached to a few of the people there but that wasn't what he had imagined. At all.

"A grief group?" he repeated, frowning a little. "I ain't mourning anyone, Chaff."

Chaff slowly brought his gaze up, his tone just the sharp side of ironical. " _Ain't_ you?"

Haymitch abruptly turned his head away at the sideway mention of his family and pursed his lips tight. His mouth was dry and his fingers started to shake with the urge to drink.

Silence hung in the room, heavy and complicated in ways it had never been between them.

Haymitch's past was _never_ mentioned, that was a rule. And a _good_ rule.

It was broken by the ringing of the doorbell and it was probably a good thing.

"I'll get it." Chaff said. "Should be going anyway."

Haymitch forced himself to swallow the bitterness and the resentment. "You can stay, you know. Could even move in. Neighbors ain't that bad here. Don't complain too much. Wouldn't mind a roommate."

And it was better to have a friend after night terrors sometimes.

But Chaff was just as much independent as he was if not more so it wasn't a huge surprise when he muttered a non-committing _maybe_.

Haymitch sighed and picked up the mirror box to put it away, sure that whoever was at the door was probably just a prospector or a religious group of some sort trying to recruit him. When he heard the voice, he froze.

"Hi." Effie's voice said in a rush before Chaff could even get a word in. "Oh, _Chaff_ , wasn't it? Hello, Chaff. I am looking for Haymitch? Is he here?"

There was a tinge of desperation to her tone that had him dropping the box on an armchair and hurrying to the hallway. Her blue gaze immediately snapped to him and her body _sagged_ with the loss of tension. His own relief must have been blatant on his face because she beamed one of those bright smiles of her.

Chaff stepped aside without a word and before Haymitch understood how it happened, Effie was in his arms and they were kissing and the world was making sense again.

"I am so sorry. I am _so_ sorry." she kept repeating between kisses.

He only realized she was crying when he felt the tears smearing on his own cheeks. He held her tighter, kissing her neck, her jaw…

"Shh, it's alright, sweetheart." he promised. "We're good. We're good."

And they were, he realized, because as long as she was right there by his side, nothing felt insurmountable.

He was barely aware of Chaff letting himself out with an amused smile on his face because she framed his head with her hands and pulled him down and then the kissing turned frantic and he had her pinned to the wall, desperate to get his hands on all of her at once. For that to happen, the clothes had to go.

He couldn't lift her up, not without his side hurting like hell. He had a vague plan to drag her to the couch or even up the stairs to his bedroom but, in the end, they didn't make it past the hallway.

The floor was hard, the condom he kept in his wallet wasn't as comfortable as the ones she kept in her drawer and he was glad he had done some cleaning but once he was buried inside her again, it felt like all the weight was taken off him.

They were one, _complete_ , and with that feeling he had the certainty that they would be alright.

* * *

 _Chaff is in the know and Effie found haaaaymitch! Did you like it!, hated it ? Let me know!_


	13. Chapter 13

Effie stretched when she heard the soft _click_ of the light being turned off in the bathroom. She didn't even try to stop her grin when Haymitch paused on the threshold, on his way back, and stared at her with that particular kind of hunger in his eyes she was quickly growing accustomed to. Apparently, having her sprawled on his bed, wearing his white shirt, was a turn-on. She would have to remember for later.

"You never said how you found me." he said, climbing back on the bed and immediately wrapping his arms around her. "Never told you where I lived."

His bedroom wasn't at all to her tastes but it was also everything she had expected. It was clearly a bachelor's room with its dirty clothes littering the floor and no sign of organization skills whatsoever. There had been a recent attempt at cleaning – she could see that – but it hadn't been that conclusive and she was itching to send Lavinia over in the near future – as well as buying a new mattress because that one was saggy and wouldn't do.

"I followed the bond." she hummed, pressing her face in the crook of his shoulder. The smell of him immediately grounded her, _appeased_ her.

He snorted against her hair. "Let me say it again, sweetheart… This _shit_ is creepy."

Her fingers ghosted on his ribs, danced down until she met the waistband of the boxers he had pulled back on…

"Creepy but useful." she admitted. "I do like the thought that I can find you anywhere if I need to."

He was silent for a moment and then his arms tightened a little around her. "Yeah. Yeah… That's not too bad."

She closed her eyes and nuzzled his neck. She was feeling the good kind of empty. She probably could have slept right then if she had let herself. It was still afternoon though and she despised the idea of wasting time like that, she wasn't the kind of person who enjoyed taking naps or doing nothing all day. And yet…

"What are you fretting about now?" he mocked but it was gentle, as gentle as the fingers that ran through her curly hair.

"I should be at work." she sighed. "But I could not stay. I missed you. And… I think we went about this soulmate thing all wrong, Haymitch. We tried to go on as if nothing happened, as if this was just some case of love at first sight…" He flinched at the mention of love but she soldiered on. She had thought it over on the way to his house. "This is _huge_. There are consequences to the bond and perhaps… Perhaps, we should simply take the time to get used to them. It is Friday, if you have your week-end free, we could just…"

He nipped at the tip of her ear. "We're going back to my plan of staying in bed until this whole thing blows over, then?"

"I am fairly sure I did not say we had to stay in bed." she answered, unable to chase the smile from her voice.

"Shame." he teased, pressing a kiss behind her ear.

She kissed his neck in retaliation but the touches were light, not exactly purposeful. He wasn't really lusting for her right now, she could feel it through their connection, he was satisfied and content to just hold her and it was good because they had been having too much sex and she was starting to _feel_ it.

"We could spend the weekend together." she insisted. "Learn how to live with this…"

"Live with _me_ , you mean." he corrected, a touch of self-loathing in his voice.

"That too." she granted, lightly scratching her nail up his side. "Just like you need to learn how to live with me." She licked her lips. "What do you say?"

His fingers got stuck in her curls and he delicately tugged to comb through the knot. "I've got an appointment at the hospital tomorrow morning I've got to go to. Other than that, I'm all yours."

"Why?" she immediately worried, drawing back to see his face. If he had gotten hurt because she had pushed him too much…

"Routine check." he said quickly. "Nothing to worry about. I've still got them every couple of weeks." She searched his face for the lie but couldn't find it. His features softened, probably because he sensed her worry, and he cupped her cheek, pulling her in for a kiss that was far less innocent. "I'm okay, princess, I promise."

She let the tension roll off her shoulders but she didn't manage to completely relax. "May I go with you?" This time, his hesitation was obvious. She sensed reluctance coming from him in waves and she figured he might not be comfortable with discussing certain topics with his doctor in front of her. "Just to the hospital." she clarified. "I could wait with you." And then she realized what else she could do there and she beamed. "Oh, I could have myself tested! I do want to get off the condoms."

She could tell her habit of jumping from topic to topic both amused him and irritated him but she didn't really care. She watched him, waiting for his reaction. His face was blank, his grey eyes a little wary.

"You're sure it's not too early for that?" he asked.

"You are my soulmate." she dismissed. "And I want to feel you inside me."

The effect of that sentence was immediate. His eyes darkened with desire and she felt the throb of it in her chest. It wasn't hers but it was just as good and it was also enough to send a pulse of pleasure downward. She wondered if they could have sex without even touching each other, if thinking about doing whatever they wanted to do to each other would be enough to make them come…

He shifted a little against the pillow, adjusting his hold on her so she was still in his arms but not so snuggled against him he couldn't see her – and perhaps also so she couldn't feel the beginning of his hard on. He must have been aware she was starting to be really sore by then even if she hadn't said anything. She could bear the small pain for that much bliss but she wouldn't have minded a small break.

"You're on the pill or…" He winced and then rubbed his face before placing his hand back on her waist. "Sweetheart, ain't that I don't wanna get rid of the condoms but there are other stuff to talk about and… If that's gonna start another fight maybe we should just leave that aside for now, yeah?"

She escaped his arms and sat up cross-legged. Her knee was pressed against his hip though, close to his soulmate words, and that was enough contact to keep her going.

"I am on the pill but I have not been that careful with it." she offered honestly before clearing her throat. "Although the pill is not as much a mean of birth control as to keep period pain to a minimum." She felt herself flush to brush such a topic when they hadn't known each other that long – or _at all_ , she couldn't ever remember talking about that with any of her previous lovers. "Haymitch, there is something you should know about me and it is not… It might make you reconsider wanting to make your life with me…"

He was freaking out.

He was freaking out because she was talking in absolute about their future although she didn't really understand what the problem was because they had more or less already acknowledged that they _were_ having a relationship and…

"Can't be worse than you being a pill addict." he snorted. The comment hurt and she flinched. Mostly because the addiction problem had stemmed from… His hand found hers and he squeezed her fingers. "Didn't mean it like that, sweetheart. Ain't much room to judge."

She dared look up, meet his eyes…

She _did_ love his eyes. They might have been her favorite thing about him.

"I cannot have children." she confessed, waiting for the recoil, the pity, the disappointment…

He simply frowned. "You're…"

"Barren." she confirmed, unable to bury the feeling of shame. He could feel it, she was certain. "Or almost so. The chances of me conceiving without medical help are so low I was told they are not worth considering. I…" She licked her lips and then shrugged. In for a penny… "I always felt something was not quite right on that front. The pain alone every month… A couple of years ago, I had a miscarriage." She waved it off before he could say anything, as if it meant nothing, as if the memory didn't still haunt her to that day. "It was an accident, I was not even aware I was pregnant. We managed to keep it from the press but… The doctors wanted to understand why it happened and… There it was." She flashed him a fake cheerful smile. "It is highly likely I will never be able to carry a child to term."

She looked back down at their joined hands, fighting the urge to cry ridiculous tears.

"That's when you started taking the pills?" he asked, a little too knowingly.

She nodded. "I was depressed. The pills were supposed to help me sleep. The prescription was too heavy and I was too liberal with my use of them, I did not mean for it to happen. I got clean as soon as I realized."

He sat up slowly but she didn't look up. She stared at their entwined fingers, musing about how much darker his skin looked against hers. He was naturally tanned and her skin was so creamy she could guess at the blue vein underneath…

"I don't want kids." he said slowly.

The laugh almost burst out of her throat but she managed to swallow it back down. It would have come out hysterical and bitter. "You do not have to say that just to…"

"Effie." The tone was commanding and she glanced up only to lower her gaze again. At least until he placed his fingers under her chin and forced her head up. It reminded her a little too much of that morning in the shower. She was tired of having important taxing conversations. She had just wanted something _easy_ when she had rushed to his house, she had thought that maybe… His grey eyes bore into hers and she had no choice but to listen. "I don't want kids. Reach through the bond. See if I'm lying."

She wasn't sure she wanted to know.

Some lies were kinder than the truth.

But his thumb was tracing soothing patterns on her jaw and she tentatively sought the connection between them. What she felt brought tears to her eyes because there was acceptance there, some relief maybe, but above all something warm and tingly that wrapped around her heart and made it lighter. She didn't have a name for it – she was afraid to give it a name because she could tell that last feeling was scaring him – but she already knew she could get addicted to it, to how it felt.

She dropped her head on his shoulder and crawled to him until she could snuggle close again.

A part of her was a little disappointed because there were other ways to have children and she had entertained the thought that perhaps one day… But for men, her impossibility to give children was sometimes a deal breaker. And if Haymitch had rejected her because of it…

"Stand by what I said this morning…" he mumbled against her neck. "You had _shitty_ relationships."

She supposed he must have sensed some of what she had been thinking or feeling.

"Perhaps." she granted. "Portia seems to think you were right about the other thing too. Apparently, I am _desperate_ to please."

She didn't manage to hide the venom from her voice.

Haymitch sighed and cradled the back of her head. "I ain't good at being pleasing, sweetheart. Hell, I'm gonna make you mad three times a day. Let's strike a deal we don't try to change for each other, yeah?"

She wasn't sure she could commit to something like that. It wasn't how she had been raised and it wasn't how she had led most of her life.

"You need new curtains." she declared instead, glaring at the brownish fabric that hung on either side of his window.

"Just be happy there _are_ curtains." he mocked, rolling with it. "Came with the house too."

She rolled her eyes. "That was unnecessary information. I suppose the mattress came with the house too. It is _awful_."

"Spoiled brat." he accused, biting down on her neck.

She would have more marks to hide but she didn't even care. She wasn't planning on going anywhere in the near future.

Her hands roamed on his back and trailed her nails down the length of his shoulder blades, making him arch a little into her. That made her grin. At least until he tangled his hand in her hair and brought her head back.

"Smug ain't a good look on you." he commented and then he kissed her.

"Any look is good on me." she retorted, not bothering to keep her arrogance in check.

They kissed and fooled around for a while but cooled things down every time it threatened to become a little too heated. They talked a little too, avoiding any mention of _heavy stuff_. It was getting late when they finally dragged themselves out of bed, lured by the prospect of food.

After having looked into all his cupboards, Haymitch wrinkled his nose. "I can make you pasta. Or we can order take-out."

Take-out would have been the easy option but she was quickly discovering she had a kink for watching Haymitch cook for her. She liked that he took the time to make her food, that it was something he did _for_ _her,_ to feed her.

So she remained wrapped around him while he cooked, raised on tip-toes to watch what he was doing over his shoulder and, later on, she ate the pasta with its tomato sauce in a chipped bowl and she mused that some food could be delicious without being sophisticated.

They ended up tangled on the couch, more busy kissing and cuddling than watching the movie they had picked on TV – Haymitch wasn't a great fan of TV, he had already confessed – it took a while for the ringing of her phone to pierce through the fog of satisfaction that was clouding her mind.

She tore away from him with a last kiss, prompting an annoyed groan.

"I need to check." she winced. "I left Portia's workshop a little abruptly, she might be worried."

He accepted that with a sigh and let her go, his hand trailing down her side, smoothing the frayed fabric of the borrowed shirt. There was a spring to her steps as she walked to the hallway to try and locate the purse she had dropped when she had arrived. The phone had gone silent by the time she found it and she wrinkled her nose when she saw all the missed calls and texts waiting for her.

She opened Portia's first and fired back a quick answer, promising she felt better and was alright. She told her she was with Haymitch now and would message her with arrangements for her fitting and dinner soon.

There were two missed calls from Octavia that she couldn't explain because she had had no appointment with her prep team that she knew of and four missed calls from Seneca, assorted with an outpour of texts she didn't bother reading.

She retreated to the kitchen and closed the door behind her before leaning against it and typing his name on her screen. She closed her eyes while the call dialed, dreading and exhausted all of a sudden. She had felt so good in Haymitch's arms she yearned to go back to them, let him wrap himself around her body, let him wrap himself around her mind…

" _Where have you been?"_ Seneca asked in an irritated tone without even a proper hello. _"I have been trying to reach you for_ hours _. Portia said you left the fitting early?"_

"I was not feeling well." she lied.

She opened her eyes and wandered around the tiny kitchen, opening cupboards at random only to close them right away to distract herself from the conversation at hand.

" _You did not post anything all afternoon."_ he reproached. " _Did I fail to impress just how important…"_

"I know." she cut him off with a touch of irritation of her own. "It is my career, Seneca, I do not need you to tell me…"

" _Apparently, you do_." he scoffed. She spotted a couple of tea box in the next cupboard she opened and she rummaged around until she found some herbal tea and some chamomile infusion. She took both out and went in search of the kettle. Seneca wasn't done though. _"Do you feel any better or are you still under the weather?"_

She could have kept the lie going on but she knew Seneca and she had no doubt he would send a doctor straight to the penthouse, probably with drugs and antibiotics that would aim at getting her back on her feet within the hour no matter if she had to crash harder when they were done being effective.

"I am better, yes." she answered. "However…"

" _Good, because I arranged for a paparazzi to be at the_ Cornucopia _tonight."_ Seneca interrupted again. " _You will be there. You will be seen. Make it interesting but not too scandalous. Something sexy, perhaps. Find someone pretty and kiss them. I am wondering if it wouldn't be the right time for a coming out… Social issues are all the rage lately… If you can find a sexy woman, perhaps a public kiss would be sulfurous enough to…"_

"My sexuality is not a chip you can play when it suits you." she snapped, a chill running down her spine.

She hated the very idea of being either applauded for a bravery she didn't feel or dragged around on talk-shows to talk about something that was private. She wasn't ashamed of it, it wasn't the issue, but right now wasn't the right time for a coming out, not with her relationship with Haymitch just starting and the whole _Escort_ thing up in the air… Besides, after the first few weeks of congratulations and fake declarations of support, there was a risk interest would wane and she would end up put in a box she didn't want to be in.

It was the very reason Seneca had always insisted she kept it private, because it wasn't worth the risk for a short lived amount of publicity.

The fact that he was even suggesting it now told her the situation was more desperate than he wanted her to think.

" _Everything is a chip in this game, Effie."_ he retorted. _"If you do not know that by now…"_

He was right of course.

He was right but the last thing she wanted to do was hurry back to the penthouse where her prep team would be waiting to make her radiant again. The last thing she wanted to do was go out to a club, dance, laugh and pretend to be over the moon. The last thing she wanted to do was find an unsuspecting person and fool around with them. The last thing she wanted to do was jeopardize what she had with the man sprawled on the couch in the next room – and even if she warned him beforehand, she couldn't imagine him being happy about her picking someone up in a club just for show.

"I am not going out tonight." she declared, finally finding the kettle in a cupboard under the sink.

" _I beg your pardon?"_ Seneca huffed.

"In fact…" She hesitated, poured water inside the kettle, put it to boil… "In fact, I will be away for a couple of days. The weekend at the very least."

" _Effie, are you kidding me?"_ he snapped, clearly losing patience. It wasn't often he grew that irritated, not with her anyway. _"Now is not the time for…"_ He stopped abruptly. There was a moment of silence and then his voice grew more understanding. _"Is it the pills again?"_

It had always been within the range of possibilities that she would relapse.

"No. I am fine." she promised. "I just… I need some time, Seneca."

Again, there was a pause.

" _We_ don't _have time."_ he replied _. "I am extremely sorry. I know you have been working hard. You hardly took any holiday in two years, I know all that, darling, but I_ cannot _give you time. It is not only_ your _career on the line, you have to understand. If you lose the_ Escort _contract, the agency suffers too and we cannot afford the loss of income right now."_

She licked her lips, rubbed her closed eyelids, felt the burn of unshed tears at the back of her throat…

"Seneca, I need the weekend. At the very least." she insisted.

" _Effie, I want your ass in that club three hours from now at the latest."_ he growled.

"I am sorry." she whispered, hating to disappoint him, hating to let him down… "I have personal issues I need to take care of and…"

" _Issues that are more important than your career? Than_ our _careers?"_ he cut her off. _"Honestly, I do not_ care _what is going on with you. Unless you are dying, you will be in that club and…"_

The conversation was going around in circles and the water was boiling. She fished two mugs from a cupboard, made sure they were clean because one of them looked a little yellow – perhaps they had come with the house too – and dropped a tea bag in each of them.

"I will talk to you on Monday." she said firmly. "Goodbye, Seneca."

" _Effie, I warn you…"_ he snapped.

She hung up.

She hated being rude, she did, but she knew that Seneca wouldn't give up until he got his way and she didn't want to give up the comfort of _Haymitch_. The bond was still too unpredictable, they were still strangers in a lot of ways and, more importantly, she truly _really_ needed a break from all the _Escort_ worries.

Her phone started ringing immediately but she turned it off – she didn't trust Seneca not to try and find her through her GPS and she was too smart not to suspect he had that kind of contingencies in place just in case something happened to her, she was worth too much money for him not to have taken certain precautions.

She carried the two mugs back to the living-room. Haymitch had paused the movie and was staring at the ceiling, lost in thoughts. His grey eyes flicked to her as soon as she walked in.

Had he heard the conversation? It seemed unlikely because of the closed door and the corridor that separated the kitchen from the living-room. But he had probably followed it through the bond and her shifting emotions.

"I am alright." she promised before he could ask.

He studied for a second and then lifted an eyebrow, a tentative smirk playing on his lips. "Not Portia, yeah?"

"No." She shook her head. "It was not Portia."

He studied her harder, something like doubt flashing in his eyes. "Should I be jealous, sweetheart? You haven't got a boyfriend stashed up somewhere, right? Cause… What you were feeling right now…"

"It was Seneca." she cut him off. "He wanted me to…" She dismissed it with a wave of her hand, unwilling to disclose the details, unwilling to think about it too long. If she lingered on it, she would feel guilty and compelled to call him back, apologize and run to do his bidding. Perhaps Portia had a point and perhaps Haymitch did too. She _was_ eager to please because she hated disappointing people she loved. "It doesn't matter."

She placed the mugs down on the cluttered coffee table and climbed back on the couch, lying down on top of him. The feeling of contentment was immediate and when he started petting her hair, she almost _purred_.

"So… I've been thinking…" he hummed.

His voice was a nice rumble under her cheek as it echoed in his chest and she closed her eyes, a smile stretching her lips. This was where she wanted to be. Nowhere else. Not tonight. Perhaps not ever again.

"Did it hurt?" she teased.

His chuckles made her lift her head a little until he was done.

"Ain't that _my_ line?" he shot back, burying his fingers deeper in her mane of curls. "Seriously though… I wanna… try something."

She propped her chin up on his chest, trying to mask her wariness before he could feel it.

"Anything you want." she agreed immediately. "But perhaps not _right now_? I need to recover from last time. And from this morning. And probably from yesterday as well…" She made it a joke but her heart sank when she saw him frown. "Let's finish the movie first?" she added quickly.

His frown deepened and there was a touch of bitter scorn in his tone. "Didn't mean sex. Ain't exactly clueless. You can't take much more of that for now, sweetheart, you're wincing when you walk…"

Was she?

Perhaps once or twice.

Still, she huffed, embarrassed. "I am _not_."

His other hand, the one that had until then innocently rested on her waist, drifted down to her ass. He pulled her upward a little and that was enough to make her purse her lips with a slight tinge of pain. She was sore. Of course she was sore. They had been having sex almost nonstop for two days and he wasn't exactly small – which she wasn't complaining about.

"Point taken." she granted reluctantly, placing her cheek back on his chest because she didn't want him to see her embarrassment – not that he couldn't _feel_ it, probably. "What is your brilliant idea?"

"Ain't an idea…" he grumbled. "Just something I thought about. Just… Let me try, yeah?"

She would have been happy to let him try whatever it was he wanted to try but since he wasn't _sharing_ what he was planning…

And then she felt it.

The warm tingles through the bond, chasing away her previous embarrassment with its simple comfort… _Fondness_ at the very least. _Affection_ too. Something else she wasn't sure how to label for fear of making him run away…

Her breath caught, her eyes filled with tears she hastily blinked away…

She felt so safe in that moment, so – _loved, she wanted to think loved but it was too soon, too big, too frightening, too_ …

"Do you feel it?" he asked uncertainly.

"Haymitch…" she breathed out.

The feelings slowly faded and she felt a little empty once they were gone, yet she knew they were right there, that if she reached through the bond…

"Seems like we can send stuff through. Consciously, I mean." he muttered, his tone analytical and far too detached for what she had just experienced. "Might come in handy."

"Let me try." she demanded and before he could give his consent, she was pushing her own feelings through the bond. Gratefulness, affection, happiness… The whole thing wrapped in that warm feeling blossoming in her heart…

He choked and then gulped down.

"Stop." he demanded, his voice rough. "Princess, _stop_."

She did immediately, propping herself on her elbow to look at him, worried and self-conscious. "I am sorry. Did I do it wrong?"

It had been so good to feel _him_ , she didn't understand why…

There was awe on his face, disbelief too and something else, something…

"Nah…" he muttered, cupping her cheek. "Nah, you didn't do it wrong but if you keep at it, I'm gonna forget you're sore and I'm gonna _fuck_ you through that couch…"

She felt a shiver of desire – maybe his, maybe hers – and she almost said it was alright, that she could bear it, that she _wanted_ it… But then she met his eyes and…

She laughed.

Carefree and joyful and truly happy for the first time in forever…

She laughed.

They made quite a pair…

There were three words on her lips but she swallowed them back.

She was pretty sure he felt a vague echo of them anyway.

She was pretty sure she felt the vague echo of his as well.

* * *

 _What did you think? Let me know!_


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